the six deaths of Alex
by Sora G. Silverwind
Summary: in a bloodless land, under a bleeding sky, Alex undertakes a quest for ultimate power
1. genesis

"**_For I have but the power to kill,  
Without – the power to die –"_**  
**_-Emily Dickinson_**

…

…

…

His hands grab at shriveled vines.

His feet dig into the rocky slopes.

His eyes look ever heavenward.

He's driven by a lone, selfish desire.

…

He slips once.

Twice.

And again.

The dust falls into his eyes.

The wind kicks at his hair.

But he's almost to his goal.

So he forges on.

…

The sweat drips down his determined face.

His teeth grit.

His eyes narrow.

His fingers clutch whatever they can get a hold of.

And he continues to ascend the rocky heights.

…

Ten feet to go.

…

Five feet.

…

Three.

…

…

…

One.

With a final heave, he pulls himself up.

He's reached the summit.

The apex of the world.

The pinnacle of mankind.

The world stretches out before him, a finished canvas waiting to be re-painted.

He inhales deeply.

He smiles knowingly.

Suddenly, a bright light fills his eyes.

The atmosphere pulses with raw, alchemical energy.

He shivers with anticipation.

And he flings his arms to the sky.

The air around him crackles.

His blood roars through his veins.

With a single flash—

—the fabric of Time ruptures.

"**Will you permit me to relieve you of those Elemental Stars?"**

Reality shatters like a twisted mirror.

"**You cannot easily discard people like I can."**

And all that is known is suddenly lost.

Distorted.

Annihilated.

"**Working for the benefit of others is quite noble. That's what Mia always said."**

The pieces fly apart...and the remnants congeal together again in a mockery of truth...

"**Who has robbed me of my dream!"**

And he falls.

And falls.

…

…

…

"**Ah, well...I can't stay the same Alex you knew forever..."**

…

…

…

And he sleeps.

…

…

…

Alex is entombed in the ruins of Mt. Aleph.

In the beating heart of the earth.

Utterly alone.

He is not alive...but not quite dead.

_I cannot escape this._

_But...what **is** this?_

_I have long lost the right to live...and yet I cannot get the relief of death._

_I..._

_I am suspended between the jaws of death and the hands of life._

_It is an infernal, lonely limbo to which I am chained._

**Felix clings to the edge of the cliff, his fingers clawing at the crumbling dirt.**

**He swings his body up to try and regain his footing.**

**He almost has it.**

**Just one more...**

**But his grip slips.**

**And he plummets to the ground below.**

His ragdoll body lies crumpled on the terrestrial floor.

His hair falls around him like broken wings.

His eyes are closed in silent surrender.

Beneath him, the warm magma stays its course in the arteries of the earth.

_It feels as though Time has stopped here._

_Yet...I am only more aware of how it passes._

_Those in the land of the living say that Time is a river, slow and constant._

_But that is an illusion._

_I know now that Time is a waterfall._

_It starts gently and lulls you into a false sense of security._

_By the time you have realized your foolishness, it is too late._

_There is no escape._

_You go over the edge._

_And in one shrieking rush—_

_It all ends._

_But that end...is not death..._

**Isaac's Muramasa blade slices through the backbone of a Chimera.**

**Violet blood spills everywhere.**

**The monster gurgles a final breath as it collapses.**

**Isaac lets out a sigh of relief.**

**But he doesn't notice its companion behind him.**

**Not until Garet's voice warns him...too late to be of any help.**

**The second Chimera swings a poison-covered claw and catches the boy by his shoulder.**

**Isaac cries out and clutches at his wound.**

**The Chimera strikes again with a rear kick.**

**Isaac flies into the sand-colored walls of Venus Lighthouse.**

**And he blacks out.**

His form is curled up like a lifeless fetus.

Wanting—needing—a place to truly rest.

But all he has right now is the suffocating warmth.

It presses in on him, a virtual coffin.

_I had it._

_I was there!_

_But it was ripped from my grasp._

_By Isaac? _

_The Wise One._

_Both._

_Neither._

_...did I ever truly have it in the first place?_

**Within that same lighthouse...**

**Jenna, Kraden, and Alex emerge from the bowels of a staircase.**

**They tread a few paces in uncertain silence.**

**Suddenly Jenna stops.**

**She bites her lip and casts her eyes downward.**

"**I...I can't leave him..."**

**Alex regards her curiously. "Jenna?"**

"**Not without trying..."**

**The girl turns and sprints back up the stairs.**

"**_Jenna!_" Kraden and Alex both shout.**

**They both take off after her.**

**At the top of the staircase...**

**Jenna is entangled in the tentacles of electricity that block the passageway.**

**Her face contorts in pain.**

**She wails.**

**One final zap—**

—**and Jenna is vomited onto the floor at Alex's feet.**

His tattered cloak covers him like a funeral cloth.

It hides a soul as putrefied...and forgotten...as carrion...

_What did I have before this, I wonder?_

_I had something._

_I know I did._

_But I..._

_I've forgotten what it was._

_And when I think of that, my heart does not feel empty._

_But when I think of what I could have had..._

_My heart cries endless, stinging tears._

**Garet lets out a yell and sends a torrent of fire at Saturos.**

**Saturos dodges and flips backward.**

**He retaliates with a searing flame attack.**

**Garet isn't quick enough.**

**He takes the full force of the blast and drops to the ground, charred.**

His prison is his grave.

But it gives him no rest.

No peace.

Every inch of him is pain itself, from his fingers to his feet, and down to the specks of dust that deign to blanket him.

_I cannot sleep._

_I cannot rest._

_Something tells me that I will never slumber._

_I am not through here._

_This is not the end._

_But for now..._

_I lie._

**Mia rushes to Garet's aid.**

**She kneels by his side and raises her hands.**

**Her palms glow blue with the power of _Ply._**

**She starts to chant an incantation.**

**Then...**

**A deadly heat wave ripples through the wintry air.**

**A blue aura springs up briefly around Mia, protecting her from the same fate as Garet.**

**Thus protected, she manages to soothe some of his burns.**

**But she is caught in the next round of fire from Saturos.**

**She collapses next to Garet.**

**Pale lids fall over aqua eyes.**

**Behind the marble statue of a water maiden...**

**Alex watches.**

A limp body remains sprawled beneath the rubble.

A young man long fallen.

Above him, Time flows its deceptively indifferent current.

_I cannot escape this._

The ruins remain untouched from where they first collapsed.

People come.

People go.

Sometimes it's a simple passing by.

Sometimes it's a wrong turn.

Sometimes...it's a tribute to a faded memory...

_Something tells me that I will never slumber._

What was once a haven for life is now only a shell for the dead.

The lost.

The forgotten.

_The end...is not death..._

The young man screams silently.

But not even the sulfurous vapors can carry his ghostly voice.


	2. eidolon

The days.

The weeks.

The months.

The seasons.

The years...

They all pass mockingly over his grave.

Nothing gets in.

Nothing gets out.

The earth gurgles quietly, gasping out its breaths.

But no breath comes from the young man lying on the igneous bed below.

The warmth swirls its deadly tendrils around his limbs.

Hoping to bind him.

To bring him down.

…

…

…

_He doesn't feel them at first._

_He doesn't even know they're there._

_But the chains begin to pull._

_Hard._

_No response._

_They violently demand recognition._

_The rusted metal bites into his skin._

_And suddenly..._

_The young man breaks free from his body like a snake shedding its old scales._

_He falls forward, coated in a clear, primordial ooze._

_He catches himself on his forearms and groans._

_He's still half-contained in the shell of his corpse._

_He shakes his head slowly, trying to recover._

_But there is no mercy._

_The chains pull again._

_He gasps._

_His head breaks the surface for the first time in a long time._

_He flies through the air and lands hard on a slab of rock jutting out from the ground._

_Groaning again, he places his hands onto the sandpaper surface, trying to support himself._

_Panting._

_Wheezing._

_Naked._

_His still-damp hair clings to his exposed back._

_The primitive slime drips in gossamer strands off his trembling body._

_His muscles twitch, born anew only to fail again._

_The rock digs into his palms._

_He coughs out a glob of ooze and wipes his mouth._

_He looks around._

_The sky is red._

_The air is warm._

_It is the pulsing heart of Soltime, with stifling humidity and the suffocating warmth._

_The land is barren._

_Dry._

_Lonely._

_Not even one blade of grass breaks the desolate monotony._

_He sighs and hugs himself._

_His skin is moist with slime and sweat._

_A raspy caw splits the air._

_The young man looks to the sky._

_A raven circles over him, beating its wings._

_It alights some distance away from him, claws scratching the cracked ground._

_It seems to beckon to him with a single ebony eye._

_He attempts to stand up._

_But the rock under his feet is greasy with slime._

_And he slips._

_With a cry, he slides down the serrated slopes._

_He lands on the dusty earth, wincing._

_He reaches behind him and rubs his back._

_There are wounds...but no blood._

_Only a tepid sort of hollowness._

_A moderate Soltime breeze hisses through._

_He shudders._

_The over-baked dirt burns itself into his skin._

_The air wavers around him like an unstable illusion._

_The young man suddenly feels a weight on his hands._

_He looks down._

_Miniature shackles encircle each of his fingers._

_He blinks and lifts a hand up._

_His cold eyes scrutinize the chains dangling from the rusted cuffs._

_He shakes them uncertainly._

_The links rattle off a laughing requiem._

_His eyes narrow._

_The chains twitch._

_...his eyes widen._

_The chains jerk._

_And he's dragged across the dead landscape._

_As bloodless as his own form._

_No blood._

_Only pain...and the warmth._

…

…

…

_The chains pull him to a dilapidated town._

_They unceremoniously dump him atop what used to be a fountain._

_The marble shards embed themselves into his limbs._

_He grits his teeth and sits up._

_Still wet._

_Still warm._

_But now dust hugs his body like a second skin._

_The stringy robe of an angel that never was._

_He pushes back his sopping bangs and lies down._

_Waiting._

…

…

…

_And then..._

_Two scarred feet glistening with ooze pad their way into his line of vision._

_The young man sits up._

_And the Eidolon meets his gaze._

_The Eidolon is a tired old man._

_Pale, naked, and wet._

_He stands tall but hunched, laden with coils upon coils of large, rusty chains._

_His hair gleams white as death, lightly stained by the scarlet sky._

_His remaining eye holds a glass-hard stare of aquamarine._

_His face is as chiseled and emotionless as carved stone._

_The young man regards him curiously._

_The Eidolon shuffles forward once._

_His own chains shriek and screech with every move he makes._

_He speaks a damned name._

"_Alex."_

_The young man's fists curls up._

_His whole being grimaces._

_He opens his mouth to say something..._

_...but his words float away._

_The Eidolon continues to gaze at him._

"_I have come to kill you," he utters._

_The young man blinks unbelievingly._

"_How long did it take for me to get here?" he asks._

_The Eidolon shakes his head._

"_That is of no importance now. What little there is here cannot be measured. It all blends together...and it is all soon forgotten."_

_The young man looks around him._

_Decimated homes._

_Charcoal trees._

_And the crimson sky._

_His eyes return to the spectre in front of him._

"_Is this Tartarus?" he asks._

"_We would desire it so," is the Eidolon's reply._

_The young man takes a deep breath...and lets it out._

_He closes his eyes._

_Knowing he can't sleep._

_His own chains clatter around him...a constant reminder._

_He lifts his lids again._

_The Eidolon stands behind him, looking around._

"_You ask how long it took for you to get here," the Eidolon says. "But the question should be, how long will it take for you to get **there**?" _

_And a wrinkled, bony hand gestures out at the desert nothingness before them._

_Dead and blank._

"_See the futility of such inquiries," the Eidolon says. "Here in this bloodless land, the past disappears like dust in the wind. There is a fleeting moment of the present, and the future—whatever is left of it—looms forever over our heads. But it is hard to tell even those two apart, for every moment passes the same. There is no point in keeping track of Time." He looks at the young man. "I have asked myself the very same question you asked, many times over. How long has it taken me to get here, I wonder. But I have not been able to figure it out, and I no longer desire to now. Instead, I ask...how long will it take for me to reach the end?"_

_The young man's head snaps up, wondering at the meaning of the words._

_The Eidolon's eyes are worn now._

"_I must finish this," he mumbles, shaking his head. "I must finish what I came here to do...what I was summoned to do. I must reach the end."_

"_You must kill me."_

"_Yes."_

_A lonely wind whistles._

_The young man heaves a sigh._

_But it sounds more like a laugh._

"_There is no reason to wait any longer, then," he says breathlessly. "What do I have to cling to? Nothing! I killed my own past and my future was taken from me! And in this present, I only see stagnation. I cannot escape. There is...**nothing**...anymore..."_

_He looks almost pleadingly at the Eidolon._

"_Do your job. Give me the oblivion that you hold. Give me...the silence."_

_The Eidolon stares at him._

"_I cannot."_

_The young man's eyes fly open._

_His lips tighten in bewilderment and anger._

_He gets to his feet, hands ready to weave a familiar spell—_

"_There is something you must do as well, Alex. We are linked by Fate; I cannot do my job unless you do yours."_

_The young man falters._

_His hands freeze in their magical dance._

"_Something...I must do?"_

"_Yes. You are a Reaper."_

_The young man blinks._

_He lets his hands fall._

_The Eidolon looks at him seriously. "When you were...alive...you strove for nothing but power. Pure, raw power, at any cost and at any pain. You knew what you wanted, and you knew how to get it._

"_The world was your chessboard, and you played it easily, effortlessly. Pawns, bishops, kings, knights...all fell equally to your hands. Even more, most weren't aware of their fall. Your machinations were subtle, nigh-invisible, and yet they spoke volumes about your skills and cunning._

"_Here...if you can think to call this 'here'...you still possess that power. Silent death. Seamless destruction. And at the last...oblivion. You can use it, wield it...like you always have."_

_The young man listens._

_The dust continues to cake around his ankles._

"_Do you understand, Alex? Your legacy follows you. This is a checkmate not fully declared. You must follow through. You must finish the game."_

"_Finish the game?"_

"_You knew your goals as you played in the world of the living. Your very life was the individual moves to triumph. Why suddenly stop when you are one tiny word away from victory?"_

_The young man mulls this over._

_The Eidolon watches him._

"_...what must I do?"_

"_You are a Reaper. There are souls you must harvest. The souls of those that drag you down, and thus keep you from your goal."_

"_Pah." The young man spits to the side. "I have no such obstacles. I am a man alone."_

"_If that were true, we would not be here right now." A stern glance. "You have connections, Alex. They vary greatly in their nature, but nevertheless, they drag you down. You must sever those connections and free yourself to taste true power. Is that not what you've wanted?"_

_The young man regards the Eidolon silently, his face expressionless._

_The Eidolon continues._

"_If you do your job, then I can do mine. And then...we can both rest."_

_A pause._

"_Rest," the young man whispers. A corner of his mouth curls in a sardonic smile. "I've forgotten what that word means."_

_The Eidolon peels off a number of his chains and offers them to his companion._

_The young man takes them into his hands._

_The links are warm._

_Very warm._

_But not with life._

_The sky bleeds._

_The earth wheezes._

"_You will take these to your reapings," the Eidolon commands. "Each and every one of them."_

"_And who, exactly, are my reapings?"_

"_You need not worry. The chains will take you where you need to go. You must concern yourself with only one thing, and that is with your job." The Eidolon gestures. "Go."_

_The air is still._

_The young man gathers the chains to his bare chest._

_He plants a bare, still-damp sole to the dusty earth._

_One in front of the other._

_The Eidolon vanishes._

_The young man blinks, startled at the sudden disappearance._

_But he trudges on._

_The chains trails behind him like strangling ribbons._

_His eyes are fixed on the scarlet horizon._

_It is the last hope he will ever receive._


	3. the quiet companion

_He marches forward through the darkness._

_Pulsing with warmth._

_His mouth a grim line of determination._

_The darkness slowly begins to fade._

_And a silhouette of tree branches forms a roof overhead._

_Then..._

_The hum of voices._

_The rustle of leaves._

_He presses on._

…

…

…

Felix is silent as he leads a small band of men through the forest.

His dark brown hair hangs raggedly to just below his jawline.

A curved scar cuts across his cheekbone.

His is a face that has seen too much.

Twenty-six going on seventy.

"You know your places?" he whispers to the men behind him.

They nod.

"Remember, it is imperative that we take that gunpowder. Once we have that, we can threaten Tolbi into submission. If not by threats...then by starvation. If we secure this area, we'll be able to control all supplies in and out of the city."

They nod again.

And tread few more paces.

"We won't..._use_...the gunpowder, sir?"

Felix hesitates.

He shakes his head.

…

…

…

On and on they go.

Silent.

Weary.

They come to a fork in the path.

Felix makes a tiny gesture with his head.

The men scatter.

Hiding behind trees.

Or rocks.

Whatever they can find.

Felix is the last to take his place, flattening himself against a lichen-covered tree trunk.

He peers carefully over his shoulder, alert.

His hands grip the well-used hilt of Excalibur.

He controls his breathing.

Suddenly, there's a muffled curse from somewhere.

Felix mentally joins in.

He bites his tongue to avoid yelling out a reprimand.

But then screams ring out.

Harsh explosions crack the air.

And the forest begins to burn around Felix.

Men stumble around frantically, their heads half-melted off or unrecognizable with embedded clay shards.

More panicked shouts rush in.

Felix narrows his eyes.

"What the—?"

Arrows rain down from above in a sudden rush.

With a grunt, Felix dives to the ground and calls up a Psynergetic barrier.

The projectiles bounce harmlessly off the magical shield.

He jumps to his feet, unsheathes Excalibur, and sends a _Gaia_ spell into the trees.

The foliage erupts in golden light.

Archers tumble to the ground, twitching and convulsing.

Felix hisses out a breath.

"Sir!" one of the soldiers calls. "We're being attacked!"

"I'm well aware of that!" Felix growls as he fends off another onslaught. "Someone...someone tipped them off. But who was it? _Who?_"

An arrow whizzes by the side of Felix's face from behind, almost leaving another scar to match his present one.

Felix whirls around and throws out his hand. "_Rock Slide!_"

A barrage of conjured boulders pelts the branches.

Men fall like shriveled fruit.

Somewhere in the distance, he hears the faint order of "Take out the sorcerer!"

There is a loud, resounding "Aye!"

But one response stands out from the others.

Felix snarls.

He knows that voice.

Two men approach Felix's back, weapons raised.

Felix slashes backwards.

Hands roll.

Mouths shriek.

The dirt is dyed red.

The soldiers trip, catching themselves on stubby wrists.

Felix lifts his bangs from his face and looks around.

Half of his men are already dead.

Half of the other half is mortally wounded.

The rest fight futilely.

"We need to retreat!" Felix calls. "We can't fight them off in this condition!"

Amidst the hail of arrows, the men nod a reply.

Felix turns around to flee.

But a familiar figure blocks his path.

Felix grits his teeth.

"Garet..."

Garet stands motionless.

His hands hang at his sides.

His back is stiff, his posture wary.

His eyes fix themselves on Felix's own.

Empty topaz sockets.

"_Why,_ you bastard?" Felix demands. "How could you betray New Vale like this?"

"What is there left to betray?" Garet explodes. "The Tolbians raped what was left of our land! They ripped our wealth from us! _They fucking stole my sister and sold her out as a goddamn prostitute!_"

"And so you support those who have maimed you so horribly?"

Garet swallows painfully. "I...have no choice. My family is starving—you know that as well as anyone, Felix! Everyone in New Vale is suffering! I don't want to do this, but I need the money! What else is there left to do?"

"Anything but this!" Felix sneers. "What's happened to your rebellious spirit? You...you aren't the Garet I knew. What have you done with him?"

Garet's eyes fell.

"He d-died along with New Vale..."

The air heats up.

Felix sidesteps a surprise _Fireball_ attack from Garet.

Behind him, he hears the remainder of his forces wheeze their last breaths.

He closes his eyes.

And the forest crackles to its certain doom.

"What do you fight for, Garet? The future of your family?" Felix gestures to the carnage around him. "Is _this_ the future you want for them? Is this all they can look forward to? How can you fight for something so meager and pitiful?"

Garet bares his canines. "I can only give them the smallest of superficial comforts in this world..."

"_Because you can't see past the surface! You won't see farther than that!_"

"_I **can't**_ _go any farther!" _Garet's fists tremble. "Why can't you see this, Felix? The Tolbians have won! They've taken control of the northern half of Gondowan and central Angara and they're advancing into the western part of this continent! Nothing can stop them!"

"Even if that were so, why are you so reluctant to die trying?"

"I already told you—my family needs me!" Garet glares. "I still have people that need me...unlike you!"

Felix's brown eyes flash golden.

The earth shakes and heaves up around them.

"You struck low, Jerra," Felix hisses, fingers curling. "You're a ghost of your former self."

Garet bites his lip. "W-we're all ghosts, Felix..."

_He descends from a tree branch._

_Light and airy._

_And yet...heavy like a stale breath._

_His toes touch the red-soaked ground. _

_The chains settle around him._

_He sees Felix._

_...he does a double-take._

The two stare at each other.

Still.

The land writhes around them.

A semi-laugh escapes Felix's throat.

"Well...you have your purpose," he says. "And I have mine."

He holds out Excalibur.

"At the least, we can fulfill those purposes to the best of our abilities. And maybe...one of us will be free today."

Garet nods ever imperceptibly.

Knowing.

Understanding.

He holds out a searing red palm. "_Flare Storm!"_

Felix hits the dirt as the blaze sails over him.

The edge of his cloak is singed.

He tears it off and continues the fight.

But he doesn't notice the blackened tree branch plummeting towards his figure.

It lands with a sickening smash on his back.

He lets out a yell of pain and falls to the ground, stunned and disoriented.

But he recovers and heaves the branch off of himself.

He summons the pure power of Venus in a swirl of energy.

The force of the attack sends Garet flying back into a tree trunk.

He grimaces.

Felix charges him with Excalibur.

Garet rolls to the side and onto the dirt.

Excalibur digs into the wood.

Felix yanks it out and raises it above his head.

Garet's heel shoots upwards.

Right into Felix's gut.

Felix gags.

And stumbles back.

Excalibur falls.

He grabs his side.

Red...

Red flows.

An old wound made anew.

He wheezes and sets his jaw.

_There is the barest tinge of sadness in his gaze._

_But he quickly snuffs it out._

_He takes a chain in his fingers._

_A cacophony of death rings forth._

_He flings the chain out._

_It screams into Felix's body and disappears._

_Felix shakes._

Felix kneels on the ground.

Breathing heavily.

Pouring forth red...

A copper gaze settles on his figure.

"Get up, Felix," Garet says. "You know we're not done yet."

Felix obliges.

He limps up.

He raises his hands.

Jagged rocks emerge from the ground.

He pushes his arms forward.

"_Rock Spire!"_

The terrestrial bullets slice through the smoke.

Garet flees one.

Dodges another.

The third penetrates Garet's hand.

A nail through the palm.

He screams.

Red explodes and splatters.

Felix's form shimmers. "_Summon Cybele!_"

Vines sprout from beneath Garet, tossing him every which way as they reach for the sun.

They drop him to seven feet below.

Garet lies in a twisted heap, groaning.

Felix takes a step.

And another.

The tips of his boots almost meet Garet's nose.

He extends a hand.

_He watches._

Garet stares at it.

It beckons without moving.

Tentatively...he reaches for it.

Their fingers wind around each other.

For a moment...they remember the spark of companionship.

A shared meal.

A round of good-natured jibes aimed at each other.

A sparring session.

A shoulder to lean on during an arduous part of an old journey.

All of it contained and recalled in a single touch.

And then...

Garet shines scarlet.

His fire Psynergy rushes from his body into Felix's.

And Felix's blood boils.

Literally.

Virtual lava rushes through his veins.

Burning.

Consuming.

Roasting.

His knees cave in.

His forehead sweats into the soil.

He screams.

"_AAAAAGH!"_

He can't see.

The veins have already exploded behind his eyes.

His breath stops voluntarily.

His lungs can't expand anymore.

The membranes are fried.

Tearing.

Cracking.

His tears do not relieve the blisters.

He is practically frozen by the heat.

Garet pulls out the Fire Brand.

He inhales.

Exhales.

For a moment...he falters.

His bloody grip on the Fire Brand shudders with uncertainty.

"Do it..." Felix begs hoarsely. "Oh, sweet Venus, do it now..."

Garet doesn't look.

_The young man twitches._

The Fire Brand cleaves the infernal miasma and hits its mark.

A pause.

A thin line of quickly congealing blood forms around Felix's neck.

His head detaches itself.

It rolls onto the decaying forest floor.

Features forever warped into agony.

Garet stares wordlessly at it for a moment.

He turns his back and gazes up at the sky.

He's barely aware of the hellstorm around him.

The Fire Brand falls.

Garet swivels around.

"_RRRAAAAAAGHHH!"_

He grinds his knuckles into the bark of a tree.

Leans against it...

And grits his teeth.

A few water drops fall from the clouds.

More join the descent.

Then aquatic sheets blanket the new graveyard.

And the fire smolders away.

_The forest melts into hot, dusty ground._

_The young man sits on the warm, rocky floor above his grave._

_The sulfurous fumes leak out to embrace him._

_They dissolve into the sweat and slime._

_In front of him..._

_Another young man stands up, naked._

_Glistening with ooze._

_Dripping._

_Dripping..._

_He studies the stark landscape before him._

_The sky casts a bloody glow on his dark hair._

_He gulps._

_His eyebrows scrunch up._

_He exhales through his teeth. _

_Then he sees who is behind him._

"_...heh." He tucks a sopping strand behind his ear. "Somehow I'm not surprised."_

"_It takes a lot to surprise you," his companion answers._

_The image of Garet fades into the horizon._

_Felix reaches out...but he's already gone._

_He shakes his head and closes his eyes._

"_We both did...what we had to do..." he mutters._

"_I am here to kill you."_

_Felix blinks._

"_Alex?"_

"_I am here to kill you, Felix."_

"_...is that so?"_

_Silence._

_His umber eyes slide downward._

_He wipes sweat from his moist face._

"_Maybe Garet's right..." he mumbles. "I...I don't have people who need me. Not anymore."_

_Another pause._

"_Mom was...raped and murdered during the first wave of assaults from the Tolbians. Dad died in a trap as he chased down those bastards. And Jenna..."_

_Felix swallows._

"_It's probably best...that she's in the state that she's in. Hidden away from this horrible world, knowing only her innocent, pure spectrums of light. She's suffered enough...she deserves release."_

_He turns to a merciless sun._

"_We've all fallen apart. Oh, Gods, we've all fallen." A frustrated tear mixes in with the slime on his skin. "Is this...the famed power of Alchemy? That which we unleashed? What we fought so hard to unleash?"_

_He sighs._

_The young man looks on, pursing his lips._

"_But we have made our decision," Felix continues, resignation crossing his features. "We cannot turn back. Even now..."_

_He gazes behind him._

"_You made your decision. You, too, must stick to it."_

"_...must I?"_

_It was a challenge rather than a plea._

"_Is there anything else we can do at this point but see things through to the end?" Felix responds._

_The young man looks at Felix._

_Felix holds his steady gaze._

_The young man bows his head._

_He slowly rises, blue hair sliding over his wet skin._

_And he approaches._

_The wind howls, humid and stale._

"_You know, I've always found this rather...honorable, as odd as that may sound...about you..."_

_The young man stops._

_Felix smiles a bit, though his eyes are grim. "For all the time that you traveled with us, you never once killed a single person. Injured, yes, but never killed. And yet, I know you could have. Very easily. You had the power. You had the motive. Why didn't you?"_

_Silence._

_Then..._

"_They were dead even before they were born." _

_A dry laugh from Felix._

"_I see...I suppose that's good an answer as any, especially from you."_

"_What's that supposed to mean?"_

_Felix shakes his head._

"_Do what you came here for, Alex. I cannot feel anymore...yet I know something still burns painfully inside me."_

_Frozen eyes melt ever so slightly._

_The young man reaches out._

_His fingertips touch the other's shoulder._

_And..._

_Felix turns to stone._

_Dark, glassy obsidian._

_There is no protest._

_Only acceptance into eternal, dreamless sleep._

_The young man lingers nearby, wondering._

_He starts to reach out again._

_The chains pull him away._

_He lurches forward at the same time._

_A new pair of ancient manacles squeezes his neck and wrists._

_Chains long rusted with blood._

_He stares blankly at them._

_He glances at Felix's statue before him._

_Then back to his added chains._

_A moment of reflection..._

_...and he falls backwards into black. _

_Spinning and flailing his way through the abyss._


	4. the chance fated

_The young man is tossed through the tumultuous darkness._

_No light. _

_No air._

_Just warmth, claustrophobic in its intensity._

_He spins...and spins...and spins..._

_The chains beat gyroscopically around him._

_Flecks of ooze fly off into black._

_His arms wrap around his waist._

_Then..._

_A town comes into view, painted muddy red by the dull sunset._

_Half-eaten houses and wilting trees compose this sad ghost of a settlement._

_A murky fountain bubbles out the rest of its life in the town plaza._

_He floats closer to a building, imposing and stark._

_People gather and chatter within and without._

_He presses his face to a window..._

_And drafts right in._

…

…

…

The hall is crowded, as has been the norm lately.

Villagers wondering anxiously when Death will stop for them.

They are young and old, male and female.

Their attention is focused on a long wooden table at the front of the meeting hall.

Sitting in the center is a tired, nearly broken man—the longtime mayor.

There are five other men on either side of him.

Their appearances range from late thirties to early sixties.

But one stands out even as he sits unassumingly at the far left end.

Blond-haired and blue-eyed.

Spiky hair.

Still in the prime of his life.

His presence commands authority matched only by the mayor himself.

The mayor takes a gavel in a bony hand and bangs it once.

Twice.

"I hereby call...this meeting to order," he croaks.

A night wind rushes through and seemingly blows all other conversation away.

The mayor rises with difficulty.

His arms shake as he supports himself on the table.

And he begins to speak.

"As many of you well know, the Tolbians made...unfavorable demands of us a few days ago," the mayor says, slow and deliberate in his speech. "They ask for an answer as soon as possible. Thus, the subject of our discussion today. We will run through the possible courses of action and formulate a solution. In three days...we shall vote...on our final answer to the Tolbians."

There is a startled murmur from the villagers.

"Don't we usually get two weeks to consider before voting?" a woman asks.

The mayor looks sad. "The Tolbians are...much insistent on an immediate answer. If we delay, they will take matters into their own hands." He sighs as furious whispers flit around the room. "With that, I open the house for discussion."

Immediately, about twelve or thirteen different people jump up and start screaming at the same time.

"We can't let those bastards push us around! We need to fight back!"

"I'm with Gavin! We have to kick their sorry asses out of here!"

"Yeah, but how do you propose we do that? Look at us! What the hell do we have? Nothing! _Nothing!_"

"Pfft...you young people! You don't see the strength within yourselves, the resilient spirit of Vale! We bounced back even after the collapse of Mt. Aleph! And we brought back a taste of the glory that was ancient Valeriam, the home of our ancestors, when we built New Vale! That spirit is all the resources we need!"

"Some resources! Like Emile said, we don't have anything! The last time the Tolbians charged through, they took half of our village with them! And I'm talking both supplies _and_ people! There's nothing we can do!"

"You were always a coward, Matthew. You stood idly by while the Tolbians took your entire family! Couldn't even piss in fear because you were so afraid for your pathetic life!"

"Oh, and like you were any better? Selling off Maddie and Anne for 500 gold pieces each?"

"They were threatening _their_ lives, not mine!"

"Come, now," one of the representatives chides gently. "Let us attack the views, not the person..."

"Shut up!"

"I don't believe those scumbags when they say they're annexing us in order to save our village. They were the ones who caused us to end up like this in the first place!"

"They're just trying to squeeze every last bit of juice out of us before they go on and rampage the rest of the continent."

"There has to be a way to fight back. There just _has _to! We have something they don't—that must be why they want to annex us! If we can just keep that from them—"

"There is nothing special about us, Ken. We have the things that any army needs: food, shelter, manpower, and a home base. That's it. And once those are used up, as they undoubtedly will be, we will be worth nothing to them."

"We're going to die anyway! Why not die fighting?"

"That's what Felix did!"

"The Gods bless his soul...he was a courageous, talented young man..."

"Hmph. Not to anger the dead, but as good of a heart as he had, he was an idealistic fool."

"What? How _dare_ you say that about my nephew!"

"It's a free world, and I can say whatever I damn please!"

"I certainly applaud Felix's intentions, but...I don't necessarily think that he went about it the right way. That's why he ended up dead."

"Right, like a full-fledged militia wouldn't have any casualties?"

"That's not what I'm saying, and you know it!"

"We _can_ fight back. I know we can. It might seem impossible now, but like Mr. Ezra said, it's all within us. It's in our spirits. I know that sounds overly sentimental, but any change that we're going to cause in our situation needs to start within us. We have to adapt the right mindset for change, for a better future. And then we'll be able to see our physical resources all around us."

"Ah, Ivan! So the young aren't so hopeless after all."

A chair creaks from the front of the room.

Everyone turns to look.

Isaac has stood up.

His palms rest on the table edge as he gazes out at the sea of despairing faces. "What is spirit now," he says, "without a tangible way to back it up?"

Ivan frowns. "Don't you think that contradicts the definition of spirit?"

"Maybe it does," Isaac answers. "Still...we might have this 'spirit,' but that alone can't defeat our enemies. You said that our 'spirit' will let us see the physical resources around us, but you're simply denying the reality of our situation! Our numbers are dwindling, both from fighting and starvation. We lack the monetary resources and favorable connections to do anything to push the Tolbians back."

The fury of an inner storm blazes within Ivan's violet eyes as he glares at Isaac. "Are you saying we should just give up?"

Isaac sighs. "This isn't giving up—it's simply biding our time for a while until we get a clear chance to recover," he says. He turns his palms outward. "Look, Ivan, I'm no happier with this course of action than you are. No matter how you draw it, people will get hurt. But if we try to push ourselves now, we're going to burn out. Vale needs to rest for a little bit."

"At this rate, Vale is going to be resting in peace," Ivan retorts.

Isaac inhales sharply. "There's no doubt that either of the two choices we have before us are going to be painful and costly. But if we want to see Vale thrive again—even if it's not within our lifetimes—we must bend to the winds. Fighting back in our state would be total suicide. I believe it would be in our best interests to do as the Tolbians demand, as severe as it undoubtedly is."

An old crone cackles. "As if there's anything more to demand from us..."

Ivan clenches a fist. "What kind of person are you, Isaac," he growls, "to let Vale cave in like this? I can't believe you! What would Felix say?"

"Felix gambled and _lost!_" Isaac shouts. "I refuse to make the same mistake he did! I want the course with the highest odds of survival for Vale! We can't risk more than Felix did, or we risk losing everything at the drop of a hat! We'll have _nothing_ left...and we can't very well defend 'nothing'!"

The air in the room dies.

The two lock gazes with each other.

Ivan's eyes glow faintly purple for a second.

Isaac blinks and stumbles back.

A flash of understanding.

...Isaac nods.

"It...it is my final answer," he says.

Ivan looks away, sadness washing away any anger he had.

Outside the window, a slender figure listens in.

She catches the turn of Ivan's head.

Her emerald eyes narrow.

And she disappears with the wind.

Inside, the debate continues...albeit a little more subdued than before.

…

…

…

Two hours later, the people disperse, heading for homes that are barely there and families that are torn asunder.

Any warmth that remains in this town comes only from tears.

Isaac is one of the last to leave the meeting hall.

"Isaac," the mayor says, beckoning.

Isaac looks over his shoulder.

The mayor coughs. "I w-would just...like...to thank you...for agreeing to not fight the Tolbians..."

Isaac's face softens. "You're still unwilling to possibly come up against Garet."

The mayor nods.

Isaac runs a hand over his face. "Mayor...I didn't do it for Garet. He's still my best friend, and I certainly don't wish any harm on him. But right now, I'm only thinking of what would be in the best interest for Vale...whatever would allow Vale to survive as long as possible until we find better opportunities."

The mayor chuckles. "You realize that many Valeans would be willing to take you up on your ideas? They absolutely admire you, for going on your quest all those years ago..."

Isaac shakes his head, embarrassed. "Just because I went on a journey to fix a wrong doesn't mean I know anything about politics or running a town or anything like that. I just love my home. It's broken and battered now...and I'll do anything to fix it."

"Well, that's a fairly big reason as to why they adore you. And they need a beacon of hope, someone to cling to. You provide that."

"Well, a lot of other people are rallying around Ivan, too," Isaac says, grinning a bit. "Can't say I blame them, though. Ivan's grown a lot since he came to live here. It's hard to believe he was such a meek guy when I first met him. And now, here he is, gathering followers and voicing his opinions...a leader..."

A sad silence.

The mayor sighs, his beard rustling with his breath. "When we most need to be united, we are the most divided...between two friends who went on the same journey and dealt with the same hardships."

Isaac glances down.

His hands touch his yellow scarf—still a companion from the first time he put it on eight years ago.

"This is a time of war," Isaac says solemnly, though it looks like even he can't believe the reality of his own words. "War implies sides...and sides within sides."

"We take sides now," the mayor says, turning away, "but we all go to the same end eventually."

Isaac is silent.

He proceeds to step out the door—

"Isaac, how much do you remember of the history of Valeriam?"

Isaac blinks and ponders.

"Do you recall anything about when the Ankohlian army tried to seize Sol Sanctum for their own?"

"Barely. Why do you ask?"

The mayor thoughtfully runs a finger down the wood wall next to him. "Valeriam was ravaged in the first wave of attacks from Ankohl. I daresay it was sheer will on the part of the sanctum priests that the Valerians were able to drive back the Ankohlian forces." He glances out the window. "Not long after, King Shesut-mah of Ankohl issued an ultimatum to Emperor Marius III. Can you guess what that ultimatum was?"

Isaac takes a breath. "To join...or to die."

"Do you remember what the emperor's response was?"

A pause.

Isaac shakes his head.

The mayor laughs. "I don't remember either."

Isaac stares unbelievingly at the mayor.

The mayor smiles grimly. "But maybe it doesn't matter. Maybe, regardless of what decision we make, Vale will endure...because history is repeating itself in an endless loop of Time."

Isaac is silent.

"Good night, Isaac."

"G-good night, Mayor."

A bit flustered, Isaac bows and exits.

…

…

…

Isaac steps out of the hall, closing the heavy door quietly behind him.

He looks up at the night sky.

_He watches him, unmoving._

_Wondering._

_...the chains clatter._

_He trips a bit and follows after Isaac._

Down the steps and up the dusty road.

Pacing a lonely cadence.

Night has fallen, but New Vale still retains a sanguine stain.

_He struggles after him, sweating and panting._

_The chains grow heavier with every exhalation._

Isaac stops at a humble, one-room cottage by the river.

He enters.

The darkness is blinding, but he finds his way to his bed.

He sits down.

Lies down.

He presses the back of his hand to his forehead and stares at the ceiling.

_The young man stands some distance away, his lips thin._

_He pulls his chains closer to him._

Isaac sits up again and feels around for the bedside drawer.

He clutches at the knob and pulls it.

His hands draw out a flask of ale—a small, superficial comfort, and a constant one for months now.

He takes a few sips.

It's slightly bitterer than usual.

But Isaac attributes that to his mood.

He smiles thinly.

He gazes outside...not that there is much to gaze at.

Isaac then spots a shadowy figure treading the path to his cottage.

Curious, he gets up, lights an oil lantern, and raises it to the window.

_He joins Isaac at the window and looks out._

Ivan stares back at him, startled by the light.

"Ivan?" Isaac says. "What are you doing out here?"

Ivan simpers. "What, can't a guy pay an old friend a visit? I'm just here to check up on you."

Isaac laughs. "As you wish." He unlatches the door and lets Ivan in, taking his cloak from him. "You want anything to eat or drink?"

Ivan shakes his head. "I'm fine."

"Heh. It's just as well; I don't have much here anyway." Isaac plops back onto his mattress. "I'll have to buy some more things from Vault tomorrow—bread and such. They've got some surplus with the grant that Tolbi gave them. Here's hoping that the Tolbians haven't ordered them to refuse aid to us while we're still trying to give them an answer."

Ivan inclines his head.

Isaac suddenly notices the pallor on Ivan's face. "Ivan? Is something wrong?"

Ivan nearly jumps to attention. "N-no!" A pause. "No," he repeats emphatically, in a more normal tone of voice. "I'm fine. I just...I'm not here to talk politics with you, is all."

"Well, of course not," Isaac says, raising an eyebrow. "You said so yourself."

"Ah...yeah." Ivan sits bemusedly on a wooden stool. "I did say that, didn't I?"

"...are you sure you're okay?"

Ivan waves him off.

Isaac shrugs, though the concern doesn't leave his face. "It's hard on us all, Ivan," he says quietly. "This whole thing with the Tolbians is insane. And poor Sheba...it doesn't look like she's recovered from Felix's death. She's been trying so hard to shoulder his burden now, but I wish she'd come and talk to us about it...even if we do come from different 'sides' now." Isaac looked at his friend. "Does she ever talk to you, Ivan?"

"S-sometimes. She's been distant from everyone, like...like you said..."

Isaac smiles slightly. "For all the years of knowing her, she's still a mystery to me."

"Do you remember when we first came to Tolbi?" Ivan blurts out.

Isaac blinks, taken aback at the sudden change of subject. "Huh? Oh, yeah. There was so much going on, especially with Colosso season and all that. I'd never seen a place like that in all of my life! I wanted to see everything they had there, taste all the foods, play all the games..."

"Well, we got around to that soon enough," Ivan points out. "And when we did, we nearly had to drag you away from the Lucky Dice table."

"Hey, I was doing good, though! Better luck than Garet was having at the Lucky Fountain, at any rate."

"He won that cute kimono for Mia, didn't he?"

_As the two friends continue to chatter about old times, the young man sighs._

_He knows that this moment of innocence will end at his hands._

_He takes a dribbling, rusted chain and pulls it up over his head._

_He looks at it._

_Then at Isaac._

_He holds it tightly._

After a few more minutes of reminiscence, a tense silence descends upon the dwelling.

Ivan clasps his hands together and stares at them.

Isaac reaches around to untie his scarf. "I wonder how Garet is doing now..." he muses.

Ivan doesn't answer.

"I was really angry at him for leaving, before," Isaac continues. "But now I just hope that wherever he is, he's safe and alive."

Still no comment from Ivan.

Isaac suddenly notices that his hands are trembling.

His fingers fumble at the knot on his scarf, to no avail.

He tries again, shifting his head a bit to get a better view.

But his vision has become hazy.

He hobbles to his feet, his heart pounding.

He takes a step...and promptly stumbles onto the floor.

Shivering.

Sweating.

Isaac manages to turn his head up to look at Ivan. "Ivan..." he rasps. "W-would you mind...g-getting me some water...?"

Ivan's eyes are clenched shut.

He makes no effort to stand.

"I-Ivan?" Isaac asks, bewildered.

"I'm sorry, Isaac," Ivan mutters.

There's a gust of wind.

A pixie of a woman now stands next to Ivan, her face shadowed with melancholy.

Her golden hair is butchered short.

Her emerald eyes look upon Isaac with an unreadable emotion.

"Sheba?" Isaac gasps.

"I will not let Felix's dream die," she says softly.

Isaac's line of sight trails to her curled hand.

He can see the top of a small vial resting within her fingers.

And now he knows.

"The ale...you p-poisoned it?" Isaac hisses.

Sheba nods ever so slightly.

Isaac growls, both in frustration and pain. "Wh-what the hell is going on h-here?" he demands, eyes darting between the two Jupiter Adepts.

"Please, Isaac," Ivan pleads, opening his eyes again and looking at his fallen friend. "I don't hate you. _We_ don't hate you. But..." He nearly becomes hysterical. "But I can't sit idly by while the Tolbians just take everything from us! Vale has become my second home—I won't watch it be taken from me!"

"Ivan..."

"I was there," Ivan murmured, "when they invaded Kalay. Lord Hammet and Lady Layana tried to bargain with them, tried to surrender to Tolbi and become part of the new empire so they could save all they'd worked for. And you know what happened to them?" His eyes flash angrily. "_They died!_ They died a horrible, bloody death, and Kalay was completely decimated! Everything and everyone I'd loved there was gone!" He clenches his hands. "I won't let that happen again! I..." He swallows. "Gods, I don't want to lose Vale..."

"And y-yet...you'll g-gladly get rid of m-me...your friend?"

No reply.

Isaac shakily draws himself up on one elbow. "I can't b-believe you...you w-would throw our f-friendship away...for _th-that_?"

"Isaac, I don't want there to be another Kalay massacre! I...I don't want history to repeat itself! And Lord Hammet...and Lady Layana...they—"

"Hammet and L-Layana are _gone,_ Ivan!" Isaac snarls. "_There is no point in s-serving dead masters!"_

Ivan flinches.

Exhausted by his exclamation, Isaac slumps to the floor again.

A breath.

_From him._

_Warm...and dead._

_The ooze trickles eternally down his being._

_Each drop counting down the seconds..._

A few tears drip down from beneath Isaac's eyelids, staining the wood dark.

_The final step._

_The links fly—_

_And bury themselves in Isaac's heavy heart._

He trembles.

"I d-don't want to f-fight..." he murmurs. "I don't want to f-fight anymore..."

Sheba steps forward and kneels beside him.

"There's so many things we can't win against," she says. "We try...only to find ourselves beating at an earthen wall. And yet those futile attempts comprise life. Life is fighting back, struggling against the impossible odds that Fate has dealt to us. Anything else relegates you to the same plane of existence as a common pebble."

She lays a hand on Isaac's clammy cheek.

"I am sorry, Isaac. I am truly, truly sorry. We've lost so much now...made so many sacrifices...all for an uncertain, dim future."

"And is that any different from when we went to light the lighthouses?"

Sheba solemnly stands up.

"Perhaps." She looks at him ironically. "Because now...we destroy ourselves."

Ivan finally gets up from the wooden stool.

He approaches Isaac's prone form.

He starts to say something—

"Ivan...p-protect Vale for m-me...will you?"

Ivan freezes at Isaac's quiet plea.

He bites his lip.

He tries to blink back the tears.

"Protect...everyone...b-because I can't..." Isaac closes his eyes. "Not anymore..."

In an instant, Ivan whirls and flees the cottage.

With one last, sad glance back at Isaac, Sheba follows after him.

And then...

The last of Isaac's life dissolves into the nocturnal air.

His pale skin pales even more.

His blond hair wilts.

No more.

No more...

...struggle.

_The young man draws a quivering breath._

_The cottage crumbles away to warm stone._

_The trees hiss into the sky._

_And again the dust reigns._

_Isaac emerges from the empty husk of his earthly form._

_Naked._

_Wet._

_Glistening._

_He blinks oozy eyelashes._

_His azure stare meets with another one._

"_Alex?" he asks._

_The young man nods._

_Isaac's mouth twists itself into an ironic grin. _

"_Well. Fancy meeting you here."_

"_I have come to kill you, Isaac."_

_The blond sighs._

_The two look out at the same crimson sky._

_The same endless horizon._

_Searching for something they cannot chase down._

"_If Life is fighting back, then what am I supposed to do here?"_

_A breeze hums._

"_I am dead...but Death is not the end. Am I supposed to continue fighting here? To resist the pull of the cycle of Time?" Isaac's eyes settle on the chains coiled around his companion's body. "Are you fighting here, Alex? Are you fighting for something...or against something?"_

_Surprised at the question, the young man looks down at himself._

_Chains rattling._

_Blue hair dripping._

"_What's the point of fighting if we have no chance of winning? If life is an endless struggle, is it all for nothing?"_

"_Can you accept that?" comes the reply._

_Isaac shudders._

_His hands mask his face._

_And they part again, wiping away a mixture of slime and tears._

"_...y-yes."_

_He sighs._

"_It wouldn't have mattered what I did back there. The people that I love so much...and the home that I care about so much...would suffer anyway. It was, and always has been, a matter of Time. I tried to buy more, not knowing that...that there wasn't any more Time to speak of."_

_The young man stands._

_Listening._

"_I couldn't do it anymore—I just couldn't. I've been struggling for so long to protect everything...everyone...I loved...but I couldn't do it anymore. I lost too much." Isaac looks down. "It's like the mayor said. We're all cycled along to the same end. Fighting back or surrendering...it makes no difference. Even if it lasts here...the world of the living will come to a close as well. And nothing...nothing will remain."_

_The dust begins to gather at his calves._

"_Ivan...Sheba...my f-friends...we'll all go to the same end."_

_Isaac tilts his head back to face the sky...then the chained young man next to him._

"_You knew, then, didn't you?" he says. "That you only get one chance to fight a futile battle? That's why you wanted the power of the Golden Sun...to take ultimate control before it was lost forever. Am I right?"_

_A pause._

"_...I don't know."_

_They let out simultaneous breaths._

_Isaac faces the young man. _

"_I won't have to fight anymore, will I?"_

"_Not anymore."_

"_I can...rest?"_

"_Yes."_

_Isaac smiles. "Then do what you must."_

_The young man drags forward heavily, shuffling a multitude of chains._

_He reaches out._

_Their eyes meet again._

_Isaac chuckles._

"_You and I...we're so different. But here we are, at the same end, on the same road, gazing at the same scarlet horizon...running and running and never, ever getting there—"_

_The young man gulps and touches Isaac's shoulder._

"_Rest..."_

_And Isaac's laughter is carved into obsidian forever._

_The young man stares again._

_He lifts up his chains._

"_Do I fight against something...?" he mutters._

_Suddenly, he's yanked back onto the rough floor._

_The chains weigh even more on his figure._

_More flock around him, garlands of oblivion._

_They tug._

_They pull._

_They yank._

_He's whisked through a heavy veil of doubt..._

_And the hot, dry air of loneliness._


	5. the reluctant admirer

_The same violated town._

_The same desperate hopelessness._

_But this time, he drags himself to the outskirts._

_Another tiny hut._

_Even lonelier than Isaac's._

_Surrounded by a rough wooden fence._

_And dead trees._

_He passes easily through the deteriorating gate._

…

…

…

A young woman sits on an oak stool.

She rocks back and forth gently, hugging herself.

Early thirties.

Still youthful in some ways.

And she's smiling a painted smile...like that of a wooden doll that has long lost its novelty.

She closes her eyes as she softly sings an ancient song, so old that the words have long since passed away like the centuries.

"_Mie...tarathum sal fortuit...idelis das nvernes ariettus..."_

A soft knock.

The front door creaks open.

_He steps inside._

"Jenna?"

An old woman enters, holding a tray of food.

_He moves out of the way._

Her eyes are weary.

Her silvery-orange hair is pulled back into a messy bun.

Wrinkles scar her round face.

"I...I have some food for you, Jenna," she says. "Please eat...you do look like you're starving."

Jenna's song marches on.

Until her burgundy eyes notice her visitor.

They inquire about the sustenance in her hands.

"Mom..." she whispers, drawing out the lone syllable.

Her eyes roll back a bit.

She laughs breathily through her nose.

"Mommmm...you _know_ I don't like fried leeks. Or mashed potatoes! Give them...hehe...to Felix! He likes them! And anyway, he always eats my leftovers. Geez, for someone so skinny you'd never think he could beat Garet in an eating contest!"

And then she begins to sing again.

The previous moment barely a mote in the eyes of time.

Her time.

"_Ariettus...polente de meni sarigo..."_

Dora stares at the plate of stew she is holding.

She sighs.

And places it down on the floor.

_He watches as she takes another tray from his feet._

And then another.

And another.

Dusty and barely touched.

Long gone cold in the summer heat.

The flies swirl up from the food like the smoke of disturbed puffballs.

Dora gathers the neglected dishes in her arms and leaves.

The door shuts quietly with the barest of sounds.

Like a music box winding down, Jenna ceases her song.

She gets up.

"I keep on telling Mom that I don't _like_ fried leeks..."

She walks to the tray of food on the floor.

She stares curiously at it, tilting her head to one side like a cat.

...she giggles.

"Hmm...it smells almost like Mom did when we found her. Isn't that right, Felix?"

She laughs even harder.

"Right?"

More giggling, like the screech of a wounded harpy.

"_Right?"_

Then...

In one cutting motion, she grabs the plate and flings it across the room.

It lands with a shattering splatter on the already-stained wall.

"**_ISN'T THAT RIGHT, YOU FUCKING BASTARD?"_**

Jenna fumes.

Eyes wide.

Breaths heaving.

Hair unraveling like her sanity.

The stew drips.

And drips.

_The slime still hangs on him._

_Before another drop of it hits the ground, he produces a sodden chain from his being and fires it into Jenna's chest._

_Jenna's head tilts again._

Her gaze follows the course of the liquid food down the wooden wall.

"Ah...a truly privileged thing, that food is," she sighs. "Wouldn't I like to drip away like that."

She vacantly wanders over to her stool again.

"I wonder if Dad dripped away like that when that trap cut him up..."

Her glance settles on something on the nearby table.

An unfinished watercolor painting.

Done entirely in shades of red.

A jumbled mix of seemingly random splotches and shapes.

It's her own language.

Except she can't even decipher it herself.

But underneath it all...

An old pencil sketch of a sleeping Felix bleeds through.

There are other pieces of art scattered around.

Streaks of green slash through a portrait of Isaac.

Brown dots and squares hop haphazardly over a quick charcoal figure of her dad working outside.

Violet haze swirls around her pastel-rendered mom knitting in a chair.

Jenna shuffles her stool over to the edge of the table.

She sweeps the papers off the top.

They flutter sadly to the floor.

A beat for thought.

She reaches over and picks one of them up.

It's another pencil sketch.

_He moves over to see what Jenna is holding._

_...his eyes narrow._

A young man.

Beautiful.

But masculine still.

His long hair spreads out like wings behind him as waves splash around his figure.

Only his eyes are colored in so far.

Blue like clear ocean waters.

Jenna hums as she lays the sketch on the table.

She reaches over for a brush and grinds it into a color in her watercolor palette.

Cerulean thunderbolts strike their way across the paper.

Soft and painful all the same.

…

…

…

With one final flick of the wrist, Jenna finishes her latest masterpiece.

She stands up to study it.

She purses her lips.

_He waits._

She snatches the paper and rips it to pieces.

One.

Two.

Three.

Four.

Five.

Six.

_He flinches with every strip torn._

_The chains groan with him._

She kneels and rests her palms on her thighs.

A tear escapes.

And another.

"Torn...so t-torn..."

She lets herself fall to the floor.

She catches herself on weakly clenched fists.

One of them grabs a still-wet piece of paper.

Her palm colors itself cobalt.

"Why is...everything so t-torn...?"

Jenna sobs.

"We t-tried...so hard...to put everything b-back together again...but now it's all...crumbled. New Vale is crumbling. Weyard is crumbling."

She hiccups.

"Life...is crumbling..."

She shakes.

_He shakes._

_And wills himself to stop._

_But just barely._

"Raped like my m-mom. Ripped to b-bloody ribbons like my dad. And finally...executed...as a criminal...like Felix."

_He sits down beside her._

_And stares._

"I..." Jenna hiccups again. "I w-want to see my family again. Mom...Dad...Felix...I want to see you again so bad. I...want to s-see...my family..."

She lays her head down for a moment.

Then...

"**_I JUST WANT TO SEE MY GODDAMN FAMILY!"_**

Loud wails issue forth from her throat and pierce the air.

But they quickly die down as she pulls herself to her knees.

Her eyes are wide again.

This time, they gleam with revelation.

She snorts.

"Wh-what am I crying about? I'll just g-go visit them! No big deal!" She wipes her face with her sleeve. "So simple. Why didn't I think about it before? I'll go get ready now!"

Jenna jumps up.

She grabs a tattered blanket from her bed and wraps it around herself.

"I can show them this new cloak I just got from a Xiannese merchant! Mom will love it for sure, she likes floral designs. Felix will probably make fun of me for being such a girl, though..."

She chatters meaninglessly to herself as she heads out the door.

_He's dragged along with her like a loose thread fluttering from a ragged dress._

_The chains barely give him time to regain his footing._

Jenna's feet take her to a dense forest away from town.

No birds chirp.

The leaves are as still as the air.

There is nothing to welcome the woman to this forsaken place.

But she enters nonetheless.

Running on instinct.

Intuition.

Illusion.

She steps daintily over the obstacles in her way.

A fallen tree branch.

A pile of rocks.

A failed trap hole.

A rotting animal corpse.

Jenna plods onward.

She grips the blanket tightly to herself.

Still muttering.

She weaves in and out of the trees in a random pattern.

_He trails helplessly after her._

She walks.

And walks.

She occasionally trips.

She walks.

...she stops.

_He almost falls through her._

Jenna shivers and gazes upward.

"...I swear I followed their directions just right."

_Jenna turns and looks right at him._

_He stops._

"But I've passed that exact blood spot at least three times now..."

_He follows her gaze._

Behind her, against a tree trunk, is a stone decorated with a collection of red claw marks...a battle lost to time.

"Maybe...if I can just get a better view...I'll be able to see where they are."

With that, she latches onto the nearest tree trunk and proceeds to climb.

All of a sudden, she's 10 years old again.

Free from the world.

_He remains on terra firma._

_A sentry for oblivion._

Jenna deftly swings up to another tree branch.

Her frail figure bounds gracefully from limb to limb.

Halfway up, she pauses.

She perches herself on a branch like a starved bird.

Jenna removes the blanket from her shoulders and kneels down to tie one end to the branch beneath her feet.

Her hands knot the other end into a gaping circle.

She lifts up the blanket loop and threads herself through.

_Now is the time._

_He grasps the chain still hooked to her soul._

"Mom...Dad...Felix...I'll be seeing you soon," she whispers.

She closes her eyes.

And for the first time in a decade, Jenna smiles for real.

_He yanks._

She falls.

The tree moans with her weight.

_He shivers._

_Something clenches in his heart._

_He turns away._

_Even he cannot bear to watch._

Jenna's body swings like a pendulum.

Ticking off the seconds to midnight.

_He exhales._

_Still not looking._

Minutes pass.

Her skin is as blue as her shredded painting.

The last of life dissipates from her.

And she hangs.

Hangs...

_Jenna falls from her cocoon of a body and lands on the hot, stone ground like a crippled butterfly._

_She pulls back her soaked hair and rubs her eyes._

_She looks around._

_Her hands massage her arms._

_She giggles again._

"_Wow...it's so warm here..."_

_Jenna stands up and gapes at the flesh-pink clouds._

_She reaches out a trembling hand._

"_The sky is so red...like blood..." _

_She takes a step forward in awe. _

"_I want to paint this sky..."_

_The young man watches._

_Jenna suddenly notices him._

_A teenage awkwardness returns to her, unbidden._

"_A-Alex?" she stutters, blushing. "Wh-what are you doing here?"_

"_I have come to kill you, Jenna."_

_She blinks. _

"_You mean...I'm not dead yet?"_

_He shakes his head._

_Jenna stares at him._

_Unbelieving._

_She laughs uncertainly._

"_Gods, Alex...you're such a jackass, you know that?"_

_He doesn't answer._

"_You were so stuck-up, so arrogant..." Jenna's voice trembles as she tries to put her heart into words, delving into feelings locked away. "I can't count the number of times I wanted to wring your neck. You were so sweetly cruel, hiding insults under layers upon layers of words that I had to ask Kraden about. Saturos and Menardi never caught the real meaning of your sentences. But I did. And as much as I hated you for your heartlessness..." Her eyes connect with his. "I loved you for the sheer aesthetic of your word craft...your power game." _

_The young man is taken aback._

_But he is careful to retain his cool composure as he listens to Jenna's words._

"_I loved you. Mars help me, I loved you. Even though you never turned an eye to me, even though you turned your back on us all for your own selfish desires! Everything about you was so painfully beautiful and calculated. There was no way I could ignore you." She looks away in shame. "You're a living sin, every last part of you. And I'd commit you again and again."_

_The young man stares._

_Unsure of how to react to this sudden bout of sanity._

_He tries to touch her shoulder—_

"_Even now, you hurt me..." Jenna's head snaps up, catching him off guard. "I died back there, you asshole, and you tell me I'm not dead? What game are you trying to play now, huh?"_

_His body tenses._

"_That is none of your concern."_

_A bitter smirk from Jenna. "So, you're playing a game still, even in this bloodless land."_

_For the third time, the young man cannot respond adequately._

_He's just realized what Jenna has done with his words._

"_Who are the players?" she murmurs, her voice biting into him. "The pieces? The board?"_

_The wind howls around them._

"_What are the stakes?"_

"_Everything...and nothing," he replies, finding his voice again._

_Jenna opens her mouth to protest._

_But something else crosses her mind._

"_Alex...where are my parents?" she asks timidly. "Where's Felix?"_

"_They are not here."_

"_Oh no you don't!" Jenna snarls. "Don't you dare play any of your little mind games with me now! **Tell me the truth!**"_

"_They are not here," he repeats firmly._

_Jenna searches his eyes._

_And for the first time...she finds truth in them._

_Cold, hard truth._

_She stumbles back._

"_N-no..."_

_Another step._

_She falls to her knees._

"_No! It's not **fair**! It's not...it's not...!"_

_She sobs again._

_Her tears hiss into steam as soon as they hit the heated slate._

_The young man watches._

"_F-fair...it's n-not fair..."_

_He gazes down at her._

"_I want to see them," she whimpers. "I thought...if I joined them here...I could see them..."_

_He kneels down and reaches out. "Rest, Jenna..."_

_Jenna suddenly looks up._

_She looks at his outstretched palm._

_Then at him._

"_If I rest...will I see them again?" she asks._

_He freezes._

"_Y-you know...'cause I'll be d-dead...like them."_

_He inhales._

_And swallows the breath._

_He closes his eyes._

"_Yes."_

_Jenna smiles gently. "Then...I'll rest."_

_She lays down._

_Content. _

_Peaceful._

_And with a touch, her expression is rendered into hard, black stone._

_He sits for a moment, eyes resting on her tranquil form._

_Remembering._

_He sighs tiredly and tries to stand up._

_But more chains weigh him down._

_He cries out._

_He falls._

_First onto the ground...and then through it._

_Kissing the shadows once again._


	6. the bitter scorner

_The chains drag him through the stale emptiness._

_The space is stifling, forever drawn into a tight vacuum._

_Just when the journey seems endless...it ends._

_He's flung out into a clear midday sky._

_He looks at the landscape below him._

_A large city—Tolbi._

_It's even larger and more majestic than he remembers._

_He drifts closer to a wide brick plaza._

_It's crowded with people from all corners of society._

_In the center of the plaza stands a two-tiered gallows platform, an altar of sacrifice in the name of justice._

_He floats..._

…

…

…

The throng of bystanders part neatly down the middle as a local sheriff approaches.

He is trailed by members of the Tolbian guard.

And they are trailed by ten prisoners.

Five men and five women.

Their hands are bound behind their backs.

Shackles clamp around their ankles.

A vivid array of cuts and bruises are the only instances of color on their battered forms.

They plod painfully along under the curious gazes of onlookers.

One of the women suddenly stumbles over a crack in the brick ground.

She lands with a hard thud, her dirty red hair drooping around her face.

The guard leading the prisoners merely sneers over his shoulder and yells out a harsh command.

Another soldier kicks the woman in the side, forcing her to rise.

The battered entourage continues on.

…

…

…

They've reached the gallows.

The sheriff strides over to the front of the platform and begins to speak as the prisoners ascend the creaky wooden steps.

"Righteous citizens of Tolbi!" he booms solemnly, spreading out his arms. "I, a loyal servant to His Highness, bring these criminals, these miscreants, these _outlaws_ before you so that you may learn from their mistakes and celebrate in the deliverance of justice! It is for the safety of all that we cannot—and do not—tolerate the crimes these persons have committed."

One by one, the prisoners step up and receive their nooses.

_He perches atop the wooden beam on the highest level of the scaffolding._

_The noontime sun gleams brightly on his pale, ever-wet form._

_His eyes scan the masses for his next reaping._

"Damien, the tanner. He dared to sell defective leather goods to the Tolbian guards, potentially putting these good, loyal men at risk for their lives more than necessary."

A man with a coal-black mustache scowls. "I cannot sell the best if you cannot give me the best tools!" he shouts.

A guard backhands him across the cheek. "Shut your mouth, worthless trash."

Murmurs flit about the crowd.

"Lynette, the entertainer. She was caught stealing food from a reputable, hard-working establishment."

A ragged woman bows her head as silent tears stream down her face.

From some distance away, a father hugs his two children as all three of them sob quietly.

"Nichols, the carpenter. He questioned the authority of the local guard and slandered our great ruler for personal profit."

_As he studies the shifting sea of faces, the young man catches sight of a group hidden in the shadows._

_His eyes squint, but he can't make out any features at this distance._

_So he waits._

The litany of offenses continues.

"Rizan, the beggar. Disturbed the peace with continual false accusations of the Tolbian government, some of which spurned a local rebel group to murder three of our best officers."

"Lars, the beggar. Accomplice to Rizan's treachery."

"Fay, the seamstress. Conspired to marry above her rank."

Behind the gallows, two well-dressed men raise their eyebrows at Fay. They exchange a few words, then shake their heads sadly.

"Hughes, the common laborer. Refused to obey his superior in the production of new weaponry for the security of our motherland."

"Neena, the chef. She severely maimed a number of Tolbian soldiers."

"It was in self-defense!" she cries. "_They were trying to rape me!"_

The guard from before smacks her.

The whispers and mutters continue to hum in the air.

"Marisel, the prostitute. Continually refused service while taking the money of hard-working citizens."

At this point, the sheriff stops speaking and glances up.

The nine named prisoners stand gloomily on the first level of the gallows like a row of gravestones, their heads bowed and the rough nooses around their necks.

But one still remains.

Two guards lead the red-haired woman up yet a second set of steps, to a lone noose hanging high above the others.

The rope is fitted around her.

She is biting her lip and trembling visibly.

A barely imperceptible smirk passes over the sheriff's face before he continues.

"Finally...you, the good people of Tolbi, have before you the vilest and most debased creature of them all today. For this woman not only refused to do as her profession required of her, but in a true display of demonic perversion, she turned on her client and _killed _him." His bushy eyebrows rise in indignation. "Kaydence, the prostitute. This is not her first time contending with the Tolbian authorities. She has been caught numerous times leeching off the rightly-earned resources of your fellow citizens, and foolishly let off like a spoiled child in every instance. Even more, she is proven to have connections to an underground rebel group that conspires against our ruler! But she has finally crossed the line by taking the life of a hard-working man of peace, and for what, a momentary bout of inconvenience? It is silly, it is trivial, it is unforgivable."

Kay's shoulders are slumped.

The words sting her, but there is nothing she can do except wait.

"And yet," the sheriff says, facing Kay again, "as a worker for justice, peace, and righteousness, I will allow you one last chance to defend yourself. What have you to say about your wretched crimes, Miss Kay? Will you offer up your guilt? Will you plead for mercy from His Greatness?"

Kay glares down at him with sorrowful hatred.

But soon her eyes stray to her surroundings.

And, hidden in the noontime shadows, beyond the common masses...

She catches a glimpse of warmly familiar red-brown.

Her jaw almost drops, but she catches herself in time.

Beneath her, the sheriff waits impatiently, triumphantly.

Kay looks down at him again.

And then she looks out.

"There is...nothing...for me to defend," she declares, a renewed energy within her. "I have committed no crime, unless defense of my inherent dignity is a crime. To plead guilty to something I did not do..._that_ is a crime. To sit back and remain quiet about the corruption among those that claim to be defenders of the just and true..._that_ is a crime." Her eyes flash with a long-reserved fury. "_To go down under this hypocritical, petty, and dishonest regime without fighting...**that**__is a crime!"_

The sheriff's face is livid with fury.

He opens his mouth to speak—

"There has been silence in these streets for far too long," Kay says, "silence often instigated by the authorities here to keep up with this ridiculous façade of order and tranquility. They call it justice, but how can you call a system that does nothing to help the beggars and the homeless 'just'? You punish them for stealing, for shoddy worksmanship, but you have given them no other choice in the matter! How can you call a system that looks the other way on crimes if you feed it the right amount of gold 'just'? It is illogical and unfair to take away from those who have nothing and give it to those who have more than enough." Her eyes tear up. "How can you call a system...that th-thinks taking away...a mother's child...and slitting his throat in f-front of her own eyes..._just_?"

The mumbling amongst the people begins to crescendo.

In a fit of rage, the sheriff nearly rips open the parchment he has been reading from.

"You see what poison she spouts from her tainted lips?" he cries. "You see the darkness welling up within her, the desire to pervert all that is good? Such actions will _never_ be tolerated in the regime of our great ruler!" He draws a sword and pierces the air with it. The sun glints off the steel tip. "In his name...**_let justice be done!_**"

A guard moves to spring the trapdoors beneath the prisoners...

But a well-aimed arrow flies into his throat.

He gurgles and falls off the platform.

The sheriff whirls around as the guard's corpse lands with a thud next to his feet. "What the hell—?"

More arrows zip through the air, effectively picking off a good number of the sheriff's accompanying band of guards.

The gathered bystanders gasp and look around.

A group of archers dressed in dark blue line the rooftop of a building adjacent to the plaza.

"Who is responsible for this?" the sheriff demands. He brandishes his blade. "_Show yourself!_"

"There's no need to yell, oh honored servant," comes a calm voice, laced with sarcasm. "I'm right here."

Heads turn.

Bodies move.

Weapons flash.

A man approaches the sheriff, his mouth a thin line of anger.

His silk headdress frames his youthful features.

The sheriff smiles spitefully. "Piers of Lemuria," he drones. "I might have known. What sort of misdeed do you wish to add to your blackened parchment today?"

"If helping the unjustly sentenced is a misdeed, then the times change far too often for this one," Piers replies, folding his arms. "Babi, as much as I disagreed with his person and his politics, would never have let such atrocities occur in his city."

"Babi is dead, and so are his spineless doctrines," the sheriff spits. "It is a wonder that he ruled for so long, with naught but the best military serving under him, and he never once ventured to expand Tolbi's borders. Who is a leader that does not conquer? But our great ruler has done away with that stagnant age!"

"What, a ruler whose name you won't even speak?"

The sheriff glares, then gasps. "You!"

Another man appears from out of the crowd, dressed in the standard Tolbian guard suit.

Tall and broad-shouldered.

Copper hair.

Copper eyes.

And a scowl burned permanently into his face.

_The chains tug at him._

_The young man snaps to attention._

"Garet!" the sheriff shouts. "You're in cahoots with this old freak too? You would dare betray our ruler after all he's done for this city?"

Garet frowns. "How can I betray something I never bought into?" He unsheathes the Fire Brand. "Not that I ever wanted to buy into your bullshit, you understand."

A feminine gasp from above. "It...it's really you..."

Garet's eyes flick upward briefly. "Don't worry, Kay," he whispers. "I'll get you out of there."

"Not so fast!" the sheriff yells, waving his sword. "Guards! Spring the trapdoors _now!_"

The remaining soldiers are too slow.

A well-aimed _Flare_ from Garet incinerates the man at the trapdoor levers.

With a shout, Piers sends an _Ice Horn _spell into the air.

The frozen shards slice through a few of the ropes, releasing their prisoners.

The two rush to save them from the chaos.

Guards leave their posts and charge towards Garet and Piers.

But more arrows rain in from above, distracting them.

Fellow renegades, previously disguised, throw off their cloaks and join in the fight against the Tolbian militia.

The civilians shriek and scatter.

_The chains pull him off Kay's gallows._

_He falls and trips on his landing._

_He's lost in the mayhem._

Garet grunts and pushes against the wave of panicked people.

Two soldiers rush him.

The Fire Brand sings out and cuts a bloody arc across their throats.

They drop away, clearing a path for Garet to run up the wooden steps.

The newly freed prisoners are looking around in horror and confusion.

"It's going to be all right!" Garet says, addressing all of them. "We're gonna get you out of this shithole, okay? Hey, Romin!" he calls. "Mind coming over here and escorting these guys out? I've got business to take care of!"

Without waiting for an answer, Garet stomps up the second set of steps, his brow furrowed in determination.

_The young man has managed to disentangle himself from the bodies down below. _

_He sweeps past Piers fighting off a soldier and climbs up the scaffolding._

_He stops at the top of the second staircase._

_Watching a brother and sister reunited._

"You're alive..." Kay whispers, still in her noose. "Sweet Mars, you're alive..."

Garet smirks. "Of course I am, sis," he says. "You know it takes more than Hades to get me down."

_He takes a chain into his hand and gazes at it for a second._

_He looks up at Garet again._

_His fingers curl around the ancient metal._

Kay shakes her head. "Hardy as an armored dung beetle, as always."

"C'mon." Garet raises the Fire Brand, ready to cut her free. "Let's go home."

"The only place you'll both be going is to _hell!_"

Garet turns.

Kay gasps.

The sheriff stands behind them, his teeth bared.

His sword is pointed at Garet.

"Garetius," he snarls. "You were one of the best we had. You were even awarded the Carnelian Phoenix from our great ruler! And you're going to throw that all away for that worthless _whore_?"

Garet's eyes flash scarlet. "You cowardly asshole," he sneers. "That 'worthless whore'' happens to be my _sister_!" He settles into a battle stance. "You've insulted me for the last time!"

The sheriff lets out a yell and charges Garet.

Garet easily parries the first swing, then whirls around and tries to catch the sheriff in the gut.

The sheriff rolls to the floor, then back up into a stance.

Garet brings down his sword from above.

The sheriff blocks horizontally...but only just.

Metal grinds against metal.

Their eyes lock for a moment.

The sheriff pushes Garet off.

Garet's boot heels dig into the wood as he slides back. "Rrrghhh..." The Fire Brand flares up with his Mars Psynergy. "_Burn in hell, you bastard!_"

The sheriff smiles wryly and taps the floorboards with his foot. "Are you sure you want to do that? This _is_ a wooden scaffold, after all."

Garet falters. "What?"

"_HAH!"_ The sheriff takes advantage of Garet's lapse in concentration and attacks again with his sword.

Garet dodges.

But he steps precariously close to the edge.

The sheriff lays on blow after blow.

It's all Garet can do to stay standing.

_The young man approaches._

_He clutches the chain in his hands._

After a flurry of stabs from the sheriff, Garet sees an opening.

He lunges forward.

The sheriff smiles.

He moves deftly out of the way...and slashes at Garet's back.

The blade sails an inch above Garet's skin.

The force of the attack causes Garet to turn around.

The sheriff swings again.

Garet holds up his sword to block.

But it is too late.

The Fire Brand flies from Garet's grip.

The momentum of the sheriff's swing shoves him off the edge.

And he falls.

Kay screams his name.

The sheriff smirks.

_The young man quickly throws out his chain._

_It sails past the sheriff's shoulder and latches onto Garet's heart._

_Garet falls..._

_Falls..._

_And the chain pulls taut._

_The young man stumbles from the force._

"_Fireball!_" In mid-air, Garet sends a searing fireball straight into the sheriff's face.

The sheriff's eyes widen right before his entire body is engulfed in magical fire.

He shrieks and falls back, writhing and moaning.

With a near-superhuman effort, Garet manages to right himself in time to hit the ground with his feet.

He looks forlornly upward.

_The young man looks back down at him._

_The chain dangles from his fingers._

A stampede of boots and frenzied cries—Tolbian reinforcements—snap Garet to attention.

He casts _Eruption_ on one side.

Three soldiers are caught in the middle of the spell and promptly sink down into molten rock.

But the onslaught isn't over.

Garet punches an approaching soldier, snatches up the Fire Brand lying on the ground some distance away, and shifts his weight to slice at another.

One guard manages to catch Garet and nick him in the side.

Without missing a beat, Garet kicks the soldier out of the way, sending the man flailing into a group of his buddies.

Out of the corner of his eye, he spots another team of soldiers advancing on the plaza.

Their magical armor glitters dangerously in the sunlight.

Gauntlet-covered hands clutch either glimmering swords of silver or bows of gold.

"Wh-what the hell?" Garet stammers, backing away slightly.

"Garet!" Piers' voice miraculously rings out loud and clear from the din. "They've called in the Hermetic Guards! There's no way we can deal with them right now! We're going to have to retreat!"

Garet snarls. "I'm not leaving without Kay!"

Before Piers can answer, Garet sprints off to make his way back around the gallows.

His teeth grind as he runs.

A guard tries to take him down with a mace.

Garet shoves the Fire Brand through his gut.

The guard falls.

Sweat drips down the side of Garet's face.

He almost slips on a fresh pool of blood on the brick.

Piers is yelling frantically at him.

Through it all, Garet's attention is focused on one lonely figure at the top of the wooden structure.

Kay, still bound and in her noose, gazes fearfully at her younger brother.

She swallows and tries to keep her breath steady.

_He waits anxiously. _

_He hasn't realized that his nails are digging into his skin._

_His eyes jump from Garet, to Kay, to the sheriff..._

...slowly coming back to his senses.

_He blinks._

The sheriff, though heavily blistered and burned, is still alive.

He looks around.

Through chafed, swollen eyelids, he spots the lever to the trapdoor.

He bares his yellow teeth in a wolfish grin.

And he inches...ever so slowly...over to it...

Garet is still running.

His sword is his shield.

Bodies fly every which way from his swings.

Piers throws off his opponent and finishes him off with an _Ice Horn _through the heart.

He wipes the grime from his face.

He looks around.

His eyes widen.

The archers of the Hermetic Guard have gathered on the edges of the plaza.

They fit their magical arrows.

And aim straight for a certain Mars Adept.

Piers starts to shout a warning—

But a cursed dagger buries itself into his shoulder blade.

He stumbles to the ground, paralyzed by the spell.

Garet finally reaches the gallows.

He stomps desperately up the first set of steps.

The archers adjust their aim.

The sheriff lies gasping beneath the lever.

His face contorted in pain, he reaches up...

_The young man steps aside._

Garet barrels up the second staircase. "_**KAY!**"_

Kay's head snaps around to look at him.

The sheriff's fingers curl around the lever.

The archers lift their bows.

Garet reaches out.

_The young man closes his eyes._

The sheriff pulls.

The archers fire.

_Garet suddenly stumbles forward._

_He stops before he falls off the scaffolding again._

_He looks behind him, confused._

_His arrow-ridden corpse has tumbled through the trapdoor._

_The sheriff lies unconscious, a hideously smug expression on his burned face._

_And Kay..._

_Kay hangs._

_Garet shakes._

"_No..."_

_Kay swings._

_Garet falls to his knees and screams._

"_**NO!**"_

_He grabs at himself and sobs horribly._

_The ragdoll form of Kaydence Jerra disintegrates forever into the crimson sky._

_Garet's whole body shudders.  
_

"_RRRRRGHH!" He slams a fist into the ground. "THE GODS DAMN YOU, TOLBI! **THE GODS DAMN YOU AND YOUR SHIT-STAINED CITY!"**_

_Metal links clink against heated stone._

_Garet turns around._

_The young man is slowly walking towards him._

_...Garet grits his teeth and gets up._

"_You..."_

"_I have come to kill you, Garet."_

"_**THE FUCK YOU HAVE!**" Garet explodes, clenching his fists. "You goddamned bastard! What's your deal this time around? Couldn't get what you wanted, so now you're throwing a tantrum and taking it out on us?"_

"_Garet..."_

"_You're a power-hungry, heartless, sadistic son-of-a-bitch! Couldn't get enough of playing around with us, so here you are now, a reaper with his bloody scythe ready to lop all our heads off for the sheer pleasure of doing so! I should have known!"_

"_**Garet**..."_

"_I quite frankly have no problem with the fact that you killed me. Life was shitty and hypocritical as a Tolbian soldier. But what pisses me off is that you killed me **when I was fucking try to save the sister I thought I'd never see again! **Everything I did...everything I forced myself to endure life for...was all for **nothing** the moment your sorry ass showed up! Look at what's happened! We're both dead! WE'RE BOTH...FUCKING...D—"_

"_Garet, will you kindly shut up and **listen** to me?" the young man growls. "I don't want to be here any more than you do!" He shakes his rusted chains at Garet. "Look at these! Look at me! Does it **look** like I'm relishing the moment?"_

_Garet only smirks bitterly. "I bet you didn't know what the whole deal was when you signed up for this, did you?"_

_The young man's eyes widen._

_His hands tremble._

_He shivers uncontrollably, haunted._

"_I don't know what the hell your agenda is here," Garet continues, speaking at a normal volume now. "I don't know why you're killing all of us off—if that was you when Felix, Jenna, and Isaac all died. But I can tell just by looking at you that this isn't what you thought it would be."_

_The young man is silent._

_Garet takes a breath and closes his eyes. "Damn it...I'm so tired of all of this..." He wipes tears away with his knuckles. "So...tired..."_

_The young man takes another step._

_Garet looks at him._

"_...are **you** going to rest, Alex?"_

"_I don't know."_

_Garet laughs softly._

"_You know, I was going to say I hope you don't, because you don't deserve it...but we're both victims, aren't we? We're both victims of chance, of whoever's turning the Wheel of Fortune up there...or down there for that matter." He sits down resignedly and shakes his head. "Gods, I'm so sick of this. So sick of hating, so sick of good luck being yanked out from my hands...so sick of **everything**..." He looks up. "You know what you have to do."_

_The young man hesitates._

"_I'm not going to hate you for it, if that's what you're worried about," Garet says, looking mildly amused. "In fact, I don't hate you anymore. I used up all that hate a long time ago." He gazes up at the sky. "We...we all have our fates. Not ones set in stone from the day we're born, but fates that come about because of the things we do. And we've gotta accept those fates, and not regret what we've done...because we did...what we had to do..."_

_The wind blows, bathing the two men in fine clouds of dust and sand._

_The sun burns._

_And the young man smiles faintly._

"_Felix said the same thing, you know."_

_Garet quirks an eyebrow._

_Then the other one._

_And he laughs, long and hard._

"_Oh, Gods...he s-said...he said...pfft!" He slaps his knee. "Damn him for always being such a smart little fucker. Now I **really** need to track him down!"_

_The young man kneels down and reaches out—_

"_Hope you've accepted your fate, Alex. Otherwise it's going to hurt."_

_The young man closes his eyes._

"_It hurts either way."_

_And he touches Garet's shoulder._

_Garet turns to stone._

_Hot, black obsidian._

_Before he can blink, the young man falls under the weight of even more chains._

_He drowns in the metallic, blood-stained waves..._

_And sinks down into roiling shadows._


	7. the forsaken soulmate

_The years fly by in a searing blur._

_Faces._

_Sounds._

_Sights._

_Pain..._

_All a part of the kaleidoscope of life._

_Suddenly, the young man inhales a breath of something he has not in a long time._

_Cold._

_Sweet, refreshing cold._

_He blinks a few snowflakes off his lashes._

_An endless expanse of white stretches out before him._

_In the midst of the white is a little coastal town comfortably blanketed in snow._

_Despite the weather, it is undoubtedly alive._

…

…

…

An old woman stands atop a cliff facing the Northern Seas.

Her breath congeals in the crisp Lunatime air like a spectre manifest.

She smiles gently and revels in the wet pinpricks of snowflakes on her wrinkled face.

Her aqua blue eyes glitter warmly with the coming sunset.

"_Obleika?"_

The old woman continues to gaze out at the frigid waters.

"_Obleika _Mia?"

Mia slowly turns around. She catches sight of a tall, brown-haired man standing by a pine tree. "Ah...dear Justin," she says. "How are you today?"

Justin snorts. "I might ask that of you, _obleika._" He folds his arms. "What are you doing outside in such weather? You know your condition, and—"

"I am intimately familiar with my 'condition,' Justin, as you so eloquently put it," Mia answers. Her gentle voice is a whisper of what it once was. "As a matter of fact...we are very good friends. Which is all the more reason for me to be out here, enjoying the blessings of the land."

Her former apprentice looks quizzically around them. "_This_ is a blessing?"

Mia starts to laugh, but she is cut off by a vicious coughing fit. She claps a hand to her chest and hunches over.

Justin quickly rushes to her side. "_Obleika!_"

Mia waves him off as she suppresses the last of her coughs. "Even after all of these years, you still cannot stand the eternal Lunatime here in Imil," she said, amused. She fixes her headscarf, shaken loose by her coughing fit. "That's all right. Not many people can. We can get used to it...but it doesn't mean we like it any better."

Justin shivers, even though he's wearing a fur parka, gloves, a hat, and boots. "It depresses me," he mumbles, moving closer to his beloved teacher. "The cold reminds me of death...of stillness..."

"And being a healer doesn't?"

"Well, I mean, of course being a healer means I have to constantly deal with death," Justin hastily adds. "But sometimes, it just gets to be too much...and I just want to see green grass and blue waters again. I just want to feel...warmth...again..."

"All the more reason to search for life around you." Mia gestures to the frozen sea, to the crystalline air. "Can you feel it, Justin? The bite of the winter air? The sting of the icy ground? Such things remind you that you still live. They invigorate you, wake you up from a suffocating stupor of existence and make you keenly aware of the warm blood that runs through your veins, because you stand on the opposite extreme of your surroundings. It's true that with the coming of the snows, the trees shed their leaves, the animals dig their own graves, and the waters cease their dance. But remember this: they merely sleep. They still live in their souls. We are as much a part of the cycle as they are, and so we must take a lesson from them and remember that even in these harsh times, we are alive...maybe even more so than in other seasons."

"That's until the frostbite kills my nerves," Justin jokes.

Mia chuckles hoarsely. "Well-countered."

Justin glances at the dark violent sky. "It's getting a bit dark Won't you please come in? I don't like the idea of having you out here alone, especially at night."

Mia sighs and casts her eyes seaward again. "I suppose...I am getting a bit hungry, anyway."

Justin nods and lends Mia a shoulder to rest her curled hand upon.

Steadily, teacher and student begin to head for civilization as the sun fades away behind them.

_The chains pull him out from the arctic sea._

_He lands hard on the frozen ground and winces as the metal links cut into him._

_A shiver crackles through him as the waters bleed into his shredded skin._

_He looks up from behind a curtain of dripping hair..._

_And sees Mia's frail figure. _

"_No..." he whispers._

_The chains yank harder at him._

_He struggles against them, slipping and kicking at the snows._

"_NO!"_

_He loses the battle...and the war._

_As he's dragged along the worn pathway, he feels icicles of despair gnawing at his heart._

…

…

…

"Here." Justin places a ceramic bowl of steaming food in front of Mia. "Venison stew with peppers...one of the few things I _can _make."

Mia smiles. "It's very good," she says, sipping daintily at the scalding liquid with a spoon. "Be proud."

Justin beams.

"Now you head on home. You...your family's waiting for you. I bet little Helena's wondering where her father's wandered off to."

"Are you sure you don't need anything else?" Justin asks, clutching his hands together. "Your condition's been getting worse, it seems. Can I prepare more tea for you, or medicine, or—"

"I'm still capable of making both of those things—not to insult your abilities in either of those areas," Mia says. "I simply need to rest...and to know my student still knows how to live." She waves a weak hand. "Go on. Everything will be all right. I've been feeling better lately."

Justin sighs and puts on his winter gear. "All right," he says. "Good night, _obleika_. Please don't push yourself too hard." With that, he disappears into the night.

_He steps through the door moments before Justin closes it._

The candles on the table flicker with the cold draft.

Mia sighs sadly.

"Oh, Justin...p-please forgive me...for my lies..."

_The young man listens._

"You are so full of life, so antagonistic towards death that I'm surprised that you've kept at the healing arts for as long as you have. But perhaps that hatred for death is precisely what makes you a competent healer. And maybe it is your endless love for vitality that keeps you sane in your work. You have achieved a delicate balance in your life...and I don't wish to take that away from you by imposing the burden of my dying self."

She stands up carefully, the chair squeaking against the wooden floor.

Her trembling fingers clasp the edge of the table for support.

"I've given so much of my life to others as a healer. It has undoubtedly been rewarding...but not without a price." She smiles. "It is a strange thing, healing others...it gives one life and drains it away at the same time..."

She shuffles over to her bed and lies down.

_He shuffles over to her bed and sits at its foot._

_He hesitates._

_Reluctantly, he takes a chain and lowers it into Mia's soul._

_He grits his teeth and looks away._

"I feel...as though I have given all of my life away in my work," she murmurs, pressing the back of her hand to her forehead. "The refugees from the Tolbians all those years ago...having to tend to them and take care of them...that took the last of my resources from me. So much suffering, so much death..."

Her hand moves to rest on her stomach.

"But I have learned to befriend Death in my experience. It was the only way I could deal. Make Death your enemy, and you cannot see it with anything but fear. But make it your friend...and it comforts you, eases the pain."

She shudders as she speaks her last few words.

"I am ready. Mercury knows, I am...r-ready..."

_He grips the chains linked to Mia's soul._

_His nails dig into his lifelines._

_His breaths become shallower._

Her breaths become shallower.

Then...

"Alex?"

_His head snaps up._

_She's looking right at him with wide, glassy eyes._

_His jaw drops. _

"_Mia?" he asks._

She attempts to sit up, but another round of wheezing forces her onto her back.

_He shakes._

Mia stares into the air.

"Alex, is that you? It...it's been so long..."

"_Mia..."_

_The log cabin dissolves into the desert landscape._

_The two face each other, naked and vulnerable._

_The humidity presses even heavier._

"_So...you are my Reaper," she whispers._

_He swallows and brings himself to keep eye contact. "I've come to kill you, Mia..." he utters. "Just I like came to kill...your other friends..."_

_She regards him impassively. "You were always inclined towards Death, Alex," she murmurs._

_He gapes at her._

"_You didn't commit heinous murders or senseless killings or anything of that sort. You weren't even unnaturally violent." She looks out at the landscape—the crimson ether, the lifeless land. "But as I taught you, I could feel it within me, this...**warmth**_ _within you. Not a living warmth...but a rotting warmth. It was a penchant for Death, the worst type. You killed people from the inside out. Unlike a healer, you didn't hate Death or befriend it. No...you made it your tool for your own selfish purposes." Her voice shakes and lowers. "Just like you made tools out of us, Alex...out of m-me..."_

_He starts to approach her. "Mia, listen—"_

"_No, **you** listen!" Mia whirls on him._

_And in a swirl of cool vapors, she returns to a younger form long-forgotten over the decades._

_She is lively._

_Fierce._

_Determined._

_The young man retreats in awe and fear._

"_How could you, Alex?" she demands. "How could you betray me like that? Everything you and I had shared, had created together...you threw it all away the instant you joined Saturos and Menardi! And even them...poor them, they only wanted to save their hometown! But you craved power and perverted their good intentions!"_

"_I..."_

"_You forgot about us so easily," she continues, mercilessly stomping over any words the young man was prepared to say. "It was like I never existed to you."_

_The young man bites his lip. "I was wrong, Mia," he says quietly. "I know that now. I...I'm sorry, truly. Please, just rest now..."_

"_And when I rest, will you forget me again?"_

_He blinks._

_Mia's eyes are brimming with tears._

_He takes a breath and steps towards her._

"_I never, **ever** forgot you, Mia," he says. "I love you too much to do that."_

"_You had me fooled," comes her bittersweet reply._

_The young man's hands shake._

"_I have not forgotten, and never will forget," he says. "But you will. And for that...be grateful."_

_And he takes her into his arms and kisses her._

_The softness of feminine lips lasts for only a second._

_But the kiss itself endures for much longer._

_He steps back and stares at her bare, black figure._

_Unbelieving._

_He doesn't even notice the final layer of chains on his shoulders._

_He only sees..._

_Her._

_Forever gone._

_Forever stone._

_He collapses to his knees._

_His eyes are clenched shut, burning with restrained ears._

_He hugs himself._

_His nails tear through his skin as they retain their death grip on him._

_He shudders horribly._

_He gasps for air._

_And when he gets it..._

_The young man heaves forth his soul in one ear-shattering scream._

_Nothing answers him but a ghost of his voice._

_He clutches desperately at his ooze-soaked hair._

_He hurls another scream into the lonely desert._

_And another._

_And another._

_Until his vocal cords bleed like the sky._

_He grabs at the chains on him, trying to rip them off._

_But the metal is burnt into his flesh._

_Still he tries to claw his way out._

_They only strangle him more._

_Finally, he falls back._

_But he won't cry._

_He won't cry._

_He won't._

_He cries._

_Silently._

_Surrendering..._

_And his sorrow is swallowed up in the darkness._


	8. the final chain

_Red sky._

_Warm air._

_Barren land._

_The young man stands on a marble slab in the middle of a forsaken town._

_His hands grasp the chains that smother him._

_The wind blows dust into his hair as he gazes out at the nothingness._

_The reluctant tears have long since evaporated._

_But the pain remains...though it has been hidden away now._

_Footsteps pad closer to him on the baked earth._

_Two scarred feet._

_Still damp with primordial ooze._

_The young man doesn't turn around._

"_Have you finished your job, Alex?" the Eidolon asks._

_The young man nods, still staring._

_A pause._

_The Eidolon speaks._

"_What did you feel as you killed them? A rush of power? The thrill of oblivion? As you severed their connections, did you feel the freedom of knowing that you have cast off their chains?"_

"_I have **gained** their chains."_

"_Are you feeling regrets, Alex? Regrets have no place in a quest for power. They hold you back, drag you down from what you could become."_

"_What is power without anything to exert it on? It is worth nothing to me at this point."_

"_You cannot back out now. Do you not remember Garet's words? We all have Fates inexorably linked to our actions. You have made your choice already because of what you have done. This is your destiny, Alex of Imil. Accept it, embrace it, for you can do nothing else."_

_The Eidolon's aquamarine gaze settles on the young man._

_A silence._

"_...you see now the pain of your crime. And it paralyzes you."_

_The young man's back stiffens._

"_The weight of your chains is the weight of your crimes," the Eidolon says. "I am your Reaper...but I am also your Judge. By accepting your job, you had proved that your mind was unrepentant, ever ambitious for control. Your job, then, was also your punishment._

"_But now you are chastised, and see the error of your ways. I will relieve you of the power you have gained, and free you to the oblivion."_

_The Eidolon reaches up to touch him—_

"_Wise One."_

_The name stops the Eidolon right in his tracks._

_The young man finally turns around._

_Cold blue eyes burn against a crimson horizon._

"_I'd been wondering what your motive was for offering me the chance to gain power again...to 'finish the game'," he says. "First you snatched the Golden Sun from my grasp, seemingly for a righteous cause. And then you instructed me on how to reach again for what I had lost. But here, in this dead, dry desert, I see you for who you truly are."_

_The Eidolon glares at him with a single aquamarine eye. "What are you saying?"_

"_You were the first to reach for the Golden Sun...and the first to fail." Alex steps down from the fountain, his chains falling around him like a regal cloak. "Its pure power corrupted your soul. You tried again, only to find that you were barred from its glory forever, and you were transformed into the form you had when you struck me down on Mt. Aleph. Your soul, at that point, was eternally damned. But that didn't stop you. Now, you guard the Golden Sun not out of good will, but out of jealousy..." Alex sneers. "You're even worse than I am, Wise One. Even with the knowledge that Weyard would die without the power of Alchemy, you lied to Isaac and his friends to keep the lighthouses from being lit. You would have left an entire world to wither away because you didn't want anyone else taking the thing you so craved but could never have! At least I would create a new world from the destruction of the old; you would have forsaken it to oblivion."_

"_Alex..."_

"_You lied...no, you **manipulated** me here. When I came along, I was something you could control. So you took the chance. You spouted off things about destiny and finishing the game and other such nonsense that I believed in my desperate state of mind. You dangled the bait, and I snapped at it—even I have to admire such sleight of hand. And even now you play at more deceptions, hiding behind the façade of righteousness and justice by presuming to be my Judge when the only one who has the right to judge me is myself. Through all of this...your mutated form, your chains...you have not repented. You had—have—only one goal in mind."_

"_There is no one here to blame but yourself, Alex," the Eidolon says, his voice resonant. "When I offered you a way to taste true power, you accepted it. The guilt resides solely within your corrupted soul."_

_Alex glares. "But you knew full well that under the conditions you set, I **would** accept."_

"_Do you not see? It was a test of your mind, of your morals!"_

"_Don't dare speak to me of 'morals'," Alex growls. "Neither you nor I have them. I may be guilty of following my ambitions by taking you up on your offer, but you are guilty of setting before me the trap to eventually leech off my labors...to 'relieve me of the power I have gained'."_

_The Eidolon's mouth is set in a grim line._

_Alex laughs softly, though there is no mirth in his eyes. "This is all just a game..." he breathes. "An endless game of chess, forever cycling..."_

"_Do you see now?" the Eidolon asks. "This is the state we are reduced to. This is the Fate you and I are linked to. There was no way you could have refused my offer even if you had wanted to."_

_Alex stares at the Eidolon._

_The sun burns upon both of them._

_Alex turns his head away._

_Aqua strands obscure his eyes._

"_There is nothing to regret," the Eidolon continues. "You had no choice, and neither did your connections. You were their Reaper."_

"_No." Alex shook his head. "No...they told me things...deep, personal things...they spoke to me of fears and desires...they confided in me! Even when they knew what I was there for, and what I had done. I was not their Reaper; I was someone they could trust! **Me**, who had used them for my own purposes...who barely **knew** some of them!"_

"_That matters not in the end," the Eidolon says. "They are dead. You have done your job...and now I will do mine."_

_The Eidolon reaches out again—_

"_No, Wise One. I am not done yet."_

_The Eidolon blinks unbelievingly._

_His hand lowers._

"_What are you talking about?" he demands. "Those who hated you or loved you...they rest now. You killed them!"_

"_Look at who stands before you."_

_The Eidolon stares._

_Alex glances up again. "I hate myself, Wise One. I hate who I am and what I have done. But that means that I still have a grasp on myself." He glares. "You have lost your true body and your true self. You're not concerned with power for yourself; you're concerned with power, **period.** You don't care what happens to you, because there is no you." Alex sneers again. "For all your supposed greatness, you've been relegated to the status of a common pebble. No feeling, no awareness of existence. But my hatred won't allow me to be numb to existence."_

_A crying wind._

_Alex straightens up._

"_I am still alive, Wise One. My job is not complete."_

_The Eidolon shakes his head. "See what such connections bring you. Only more pain, more chains." He steps forward. "I shall be merciful and spare you from it...and then we can both rest—"_

"_No."_

_The Eidolon twitches in alarm._

"_This is my destiny...my fate," Alex says, his eyes blazing. "You even told me so! You say that I can wield my power here, like I always have? Then I will do so. I choose who lives, who dies...and who experiences eternal rest." _

_He holds his head up high._

" _And I say that as long as I do not rest, neither will you."_

_The Eidolon trembles._

"_Alex...finish the job."_

"_No."_

"_Finish the job, Alex."_

"_**No.**"_

"_DO IT!"_

"_I said **no**!" Alex stands firm, fists at his side. "I have made my decision! It is final!"_

"_N-no..." The Eidolon steps back, disbelieving. "You must do it...you must finish the job!"_

"_I won't answer to you anymore."_

"_But we need to rest. **I **need to rest!"_

"_You have no power over me, Wise One."_

_The Eidolon spasms demonically._

_He shrieks._

_There is a piercing blast of cold and a swirl of sharp snowflakes._

_The Eidolon is slowly freezing over._

_Cerulean vapors dance their deadly dance around him._

_Frost gathers on every hair of his body, stabbing into his pores._

_Alex recoils in shock._

"_Do you see what I have to go through?" the Eidolon growls through chattering teeth. "**This **is true pain, Alex, and how dare you accuse me of not feeling it! The cold here burns far more than the desert sun above us right now! If I had a chance to be where you are, sweating out your tears instead of having them freeze the moment they leave your eyes...I would give anything and everything! No matter the souls I'd need to reap, or the blood I'd need to spill, or even the power I would have to sacrifice! Whatever the price, I would do it in an instant!" He tears at his hair...his skin. "The cold is **life**, and it constantly tears at the burning death within me! The ice resides in my heart and keeps me eternally awake! Not even the endless trials of Tartarus can compare with the horrors I go through! **This **is true agony, and you have no idea of what it feels like!"_

_Alex gazes at the Eidolon's figure for a few more seconds._

_And he bows his head._

"_I do now."_

_The Eidolon casts a surprised look at Alex._

"_I know now...and I will leave you. I will leave you to burn in your icy inferno."_

"_Alex..."_

"_As I leave to burn in the desert sands."_

"_Alex, you...you cannot leave me here."_

"_I can."_

_Alex turns._

_And he walks away._

"_Farewell, Wise One."_

"_Return at once, Alex!"_

_No answer._

"_Do you hear me? **Come back here!**"_

_Silence._

"_I'm sorry that I lied to you!"_

_Again, nothing._

"_I'm sorry for being selfish!"_

_The earth wheezes._

"_I'm sorry for taking the Golden Sun from you!"_

_The sky bleeds._

"_**YOU CANNOT LEAVE ME HERE!**"_

_The Eidolon...freezes..._


	9. reaper

_In this bloodless land..._

_Under this bleeding sky..._

_I chose to pursue ultimate power._

_And to do that, I severed all of my connections._

_All...but one._

_I still live._

_I still know who I am. _

_What I have done._

_And what I have fallen into._

_Because of that, I hate myself._

_Fully._

_Fiercely._

_It should be punishment._

_But it only feels like surrender._

_A strangely triumphant surrender._

_I am accepting my fate...my destiny._

_I cannot escape this, and I would not._

_The chains of those that I have killed—their fears, their sorrows, their desires—keep me here in this lifeless world._

_And I will drag them with me forever...as they drag me down to a false oblivion._

_Who, exactly, were my reapings?_

_They were not "acquaintances"...the term doesn't do them justice._

_They were not "friends"...the term lacks a dimension of meaning._

_And they were not "enemies"...for there are no sides in the end._

_I cannot name what they are to me._

_It is something so infinitely precious and rare that it has no name._

_Because they trusted me even as they knew I had betrayed and would betray each and every one of them._

_They placed their trust...in a traitor..._

_Felix._

_Isaac._

_Jenna._

_Garet._

_Mia._

_Rest..._

_Rest knowing that you will no longer have to fight._

_Rest knowing that you will never remember anything._

_That sweet nothingness...and my endless pain...are all that I can give you now._

_I am...sorry._

_And yet...that means nothing in the end..._


	10. revelation

Alex is entombed in the ruins of Mt. Aleph.

In the beating heart of the earth.

Utterly alone.

He is not alive...but not quite dead.

His body lies curled on the warm igneous rock.

The warmth slithers around him.

"**It is warm where I am..."**

_His chain-laden spirit rises from his corpse._

_He throws his hair back as he looks around him._

_It is a fallen sanctuary._

_The glory of the sun snuffed out._

_His eyes catch sight of a partially collapsed passageway near him._

_He begins to walk._

"**Almost hot, but not quite. It has not crossed the threshold that separates warm from hot. It remains in the limbo of extremes."**

_And as he walks, he remembers. _

_He sees the swish of dark brown as Excalibur rings out in the worn designs of a fallen ceiling fresco._

_He hears the boyish shout of a chance hero in the wind that hisses through the cracks of stone._

_He smells the fragrance of wilted jasmine in the volcanic fumes wafting around him._

_He feels the burning wrath of a copper glare in the hot darkness._

_He tastes the sweetness of soft yet icy lips in the dust on his mouth._

_His chains continually trail behind him._

_Creaking._

_Screeching._

"**I, who was once in the cold, _am _the warmth. The stifling, suffocating warmth, the one where you can take a breath and still you choke because you feel no difference in breathing in and out and you clutch at your throat willing yourself to do what you are already doing...and you drop to the ground, exhausted. And for what? It is happening. It has already happened. It will continue to happen."**

_He suddenly comes upon a landmark._

_A wall of glassy obsidian._

_...he approaches._

_And he looks._

_A ghost of a person stares back at him from out of blank aqua eyes._

_Fingertips touch fingertips._

"**Listen: I am the breath that you exhale. I am the stale humidity of death come to chase away the crispness of life until it is time for the circle to turn again."**

_He heaves a sigh._

_His hair falls over his shoulders._

_His hand slides wetly off the shiny surface._

_He turns..._

_And he leaves himself behind._

"**The cold and the warm eternally consume each other, but they are never completely gone. It is all a circle, a cycle, and so there is no beginning and no end to it."**

_The young man walks again._

_Grim._

_Resigned._

_Chained._

_Jagged shards of granite and marble stab at his soles._

_But he barely feels the pain._

"**Life and death are not either ends or beginnings. They are both and neither at the same time. For in a circle, you must choose your own starting point. And that makes all the difference."**

_He passes through the curtains of darkness._

_He can barely see where he is going._

_His only guide is the ever-shifting threads of light at the end of the path..._

"**I know where I stand in the circle. I have always known. And I will keep that place...for as long as eternity..."**

…

…

…

_The young man stands on the rubble of a once-majestic peak._

_Still coated in eternal, primordial slime._

_He gazes at the crimson void around him._

_The heat hisses into his body._

_He shudders._

_There is a flap of wings, and he looks up._

_A raven circles overhead, casting its black shadow of death._

_It lands on the ground beneath him._

_And it waits._

_The young man nods._

_He gathers his chains and descends the blistering granite._

_But this time, he keeps his balance._

_He has learned to walk beneath a weight._

_His feet touch the dusty earth._

_The raven takes off again, cawing._

_He struggles forward._

_The chains dig into the ground._

_He yanks them out and continues on._

_He follows the raven through the ruins of New Vale._

_He gives the broken fountain a reverent glance._

_And then he moves on._

_Beyond into the wasteland._

_The desert._

_He stops._

_The raven hovers some distance away from him._

_He takes a deep breath..._

_And steps out onto the smouldering sands._

_It will be a long journey to a nonexistent end._

…

…

…

"**_This is me forever  
One of the lost ones  
The one without a name  
Without an honest heart as compass_**

_**This is me forever  
One without a name  
These lines the last endeavor  
To find the missing lifeline**_

_**Oh how I wish  
For soothing rain  
All I wish is to dream again  
My loving heart  
Lost in the dark  
For hope I'd give my everything..."**_

_**-"Nemo," Nightwish**_

"**_Give unto me your troubles  
I'll endure your suffering  
Place unto me your burden  
I'll drink your deadly poison..."_**

_**-"Give Unto Me," Evanescence**_

O-O-O

**Author's notes: Inspired by (read: respectfully but blatantly ripped from) "the six deaths of Terra" by the almighty Post, who has given his gracious permission to me to post this. Poor guy...I've stolen so many things from him and never given them back. i r so bad. If you're a Teen Titans fan, by all means read his original, because it pwnz j00.**

**Disclaimer: Golden Sun does not belong to me. All instances of OOCness in here, however, definitely do. Like they'd actually belong to anyone else.**

**Special thanks to: Kali, strep throat, the original soundtrack for _Noir_, and Post, Post, Post.**

**Review if you will, flame if you must. Is it getting hot in here?**

**-Sora G. Silverwind  
_no more pain, no memories remain, now you can play with me_**


	11. the sixth death of Alex?

Within a homely suburban abode...

A teenager sits on the arm of a living room couch, talking to a friend on the phone as she waits for her younger brother to get off the computer.

"So the girl goes, dude, what's there to do if you're under 21 and don't have a fake ID like three-fourths of the campus? And I'm like, bitch, _please!_ This is effing Chicago! How can you _not_ have something to do?"

Garbled mumbling from the other end.

The teenage girl giggles maliciously. "Yeah, I know, I'm surrounded by morons. I swear to Artemis, it's a madhouse..."

The doorbell rings.

"What the—? Hang on, gotta get the door." The girl drops the phone on the couch and runs to slip off the chain. With a crank of the knob, she pulls the door open. "Sorry, none of us play golf here—_HOLY FUCK!_"

A rusted chain flies out and pierces her bloodily through her heart.

Her eyes widen.

Her body falls.

Alex jerks his arm.

Her body flies right out the door and onto the street.

A garbage truck passes nonchalantly over her corpse, spurting out the innards for the local birds to dine on.

Alex smirks.

He saunters in, chains rattling.

He picks up the phone the teenager left on the couch. "Hey, girl!" he greets, plopping down onto the plush seats.

"_Whoah! 'Sup, homie-G?"_ comes the voice of Terra from the other end.

The scene fades to grayscale...

And an ominous voiceover mutes the ensuing conversation.

"**_Alex WINS. SORA-TALITY."_**


End file.
